Planning a trip is one of the best usecases for not being phone-only. If it was jut "open app and buy ticket" then it'd be fine, but most trips involve a lot of moving parts that need to be in sync.

Comparing multiple different websites, copying and pasting information to share, looking up locations, etc. All way easier with a mouse, keyboard, and large tabbed browser windows.

Even Airbnb is better on desktop, since it very easily resets your search queries on the mobile app, because state is managed differently vs browser you can leave 10 different spots or multiple queries open in different tabs, which is common issue in mobile apps. And tab switching on mobile browsers is very slow.

I feel exactly the same: Context switching is awful on a mobile, but great on something with a mouse and keyboard. Even copy and paste on mobile still feels weird after 10 years of doing it.

[Context: this isn’t bragging my wife and I got rid of everything we physically owned and downsized so we could do this.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44159562]

We travel so much, we keep things as “simple” as possible - Hilton and Hyatt brand hotels 95% of the time, Delta for domestic flights and preferably Delta or SkyTeam (AirFrance, Virgin Airlines, etc) for international flights. We have status with Hilton, Hyatt and Delta (Platinum Medallion) and Delta lounge access. Of course we have TSA Precheck and Clear.

We found a couple that runs a few AirBnbs in Costa Rica for our winter stays there starting next year.

In october 2022, my wife and I got rid of everything we owned that wouldn’t fit in 4 suitcases, sold our cars, rented our home [1] out to our adult son (and two of his friends that we considered family) and flew one way trips to 15 different cities until landing in our then second home [2] in Florida. We did all of the planning via a shared Google Sheet on our phone, the Delta and American airline apps and Hilton and Hyatt hotel apps.

During the past 7 months, we’ve had trips to Vegas, Costa Rica, 4-5 flights back home to ATL, a few flights to see my parents in south GA, DC, London and Niagara Falls Canada, we still have a few trips back to Atlanta and to see my parents this year.

While we are doing all of this traveling together, my wife flies to conferences and I did travel semi frequently for business as a consultant but that has died down.

At the same time, I’m managing the best use of Delta Skymiles, when to transfer points from Amex to AirFrance to get cheap domestic flights on Delta (check out r/awardtravel), Hilton points, Hyatt points either directly or by transferring from Chase. These are all using the apps.

I have a Google sheet to keep track of various credit card perks (Delta stays credits, companion passes, etc)

I have a spreadsheet with tabs for the next couple of years plans - next year we are staying in Costa Rica for a 45 days in an Airbnb and 3-4 cities domestically during the summer and a couple of other random domestic flights during the year.

I am also keeping track of my budget, when is the best time to “nomad” based on potential rental income from my home [2].

While we have one account for hotels and a shared calendar, miles flying are based on “butts in seat”, whoever flies gets the miles. But you can book flights for others using your miles. We juggle those together too.

This is all from our phones usually at night.

We really have this down to science after 3+ years.

[1] we sold our primary home last year

[2] our current home is a unit in a condotel (https://www.investopedia.com/terms/c/condotel.asp) we own. When we leave for months at a time, we just pack everything we own in 4 suitcases and store what we can’t in our one car - like my “desk” which is just a card table.

We then put our unit in the rental pool and get income whenever someone stays in our unit. That covers our mortgage and all inclusive HOA fee. But that really only works in March - mid April (spring break), during the summer and the last two or three weeks of the year.