You are the underappreciated road warrior. Day after day after day, you get your motor running. You head out on the highway. You go looking for adventure and whatever comes your way.
Make it happen, road warrior! We salute you. And we’d also like to help. So here are some free apps that can make your job a little easier, rewarding, and even fun.
1. Set up your stops
Getting from point A to point B is one thing; getting efficiently from point A to point G and all points in between is another. If you’ve got multiple stops to make, take the powerful RoadWarrior Route Planner (Android, Apple, Web) for a spin. Drop your stops into the app, select some preferences (fastest time, shortest distance, avoid highways, and the like) and it’ll find the best route for you. From there, you can use your route in one of several popular GPS apps if you’re so inclined—Google Maps, Waze, and others. The free version lets you plot eight stops at a time, with a 50-stop-per-day limit.
2. Enjoy some road reading
For long hauls, nothing passes the time quite like a good audiobook. And while there are several options out there that charge you per book or a monthly fee, LibreVox (Android, Apple) sports thousands of free, classic tomes for you to enjoy while you’re behind the wheel. You can stream books for convenience or download them on your device so you don’t have to miss a moment should you hit a data dead zone.
3. Manage your mileage
If you’re driving for work, hopefully you’re getting reimbursed for all those miles you’re racking up. But tracking mileage can be a real pain in the bumper. Thankfully, TripLog Mileage Tracker (Android, Apple) makes it relatively painless with IRS-compliant reporting that leverages your phone’s GPS chip to keep track of your miles. The free version lets you manage up to five vehicles but makes you track manually. Paid plans offer automatic tracking, web dashboards, accounting software integration, and more.
