TREK
Open SourceSelf-hosted travel planner with real-time collaboration and interactive maps
AI Summary
TREK is an open-source self-hosted travel planner with real-time synchronization, interactive maps, budget management, and packing lists. The application offers drag-and-drop planning, route optimization, document management, and works offline as a PWA on mobile devices. With SSO, 2FA, AI integration, and collaboration features like chat and polls, it's ideal for groups and privacy-conscious travelers.
✓ Pros
- +Fully self-hosted with complete data control and open-source license
- +Comprehensive features: maps, budget, packing lists, documents, chat, and journal
- +PWA with offline support and native app experience on iOS and Android
✗ Cons
- −Requires own server infrastructure and Docker knowledge for installation
- −Premium map features like 3D buildings require paid Mapbox API
Use Cases
- →Plan group trips collaboratively with real-time synchronization and role management
- →Track budget and expenses during travel with categories and multi-currency support
- →Create packing lists and distribute tasks among travelers with progress tracking
- →Optimize travel routes and visualize with maps, weather forecasts, and reservations
Who is it for?
For privacy-conscious travel groups, families, and digital nomads seeking a self-hosted alternative to commercial travel planners.
Tags
What is TREK?
TREK is a self-hosted travel planner that helps groups plan trips together. The application runs on your own infrastructure, is fully open source, and synchronises changes in real time across all participants. Anyone who does not want to hand travel data to commercial platforms gets a functionally comprehensive alternative with full control over their own stack.
TREK combines interactive map views, budget management, packing lists, and integrated document management in a single interface. As a Progressive Web App it works offline and behaves like a native application on iOS and Android.
Core features
- Real-time collaboration: Multiple travellers work on the same plan simultaneously, with chat, polls, and role management.
- Interactive maps and route optimisation: Routes can be adjusted via drag-and-drop and linked to weather forecasts and reservations. 3D building views require a Mapbox API key.
- Budget management with multi-currency support: Expenses are categorised and can be assigned to individual travellers.
- Packing lists and task assignment: Tasks can be assigned to specific people, and progress is visible to everyone.
- PWA with offline support: The application stores relevant data locally and remains usable without an internet connection.
- SSO, 2FA, and AI integration: Authentication and automation features can be configured directly through your own instance.
Who is TREK for?
Travel groups that do not want their planning to run through a third-party provider benefit most. Families with complex itineraries, digital nomads who travel continuously, and teams organising multi-day trips together cover the typical use cases.
Without Docker experience, the installation fails at the setup stage. Anyone who has never run their own server will need time before a first instance is up and running. This is not a criticism of the product, but a clear limitation on who can make practical use of TREK.
Context & alternatives
TREK belongs in the category of self-hosted productivity and planning tools, not in classic developer tooling categories. On the commercial side it is comparable to solutions such as Wanderlog or TripIt. A direct open-source alternative with a comparable feature set barely exists, which leaves TREK with little competition in this segment.
The key difference from hosted services: anyone running their own instance does not send travel data, documents, or location information to external servers. For groups with concrete privacy requirements, that is not a nice-to-have. It is the actual reason to choose it.
