Hertz Rent-a-Car

Review by eFreeware

Renting a car usually starts with a queue, a counter and a clipboard. You stand in line, repeat details you have given the same company a dozen times, and wait while someone types them in. The Hertz Rent-a-Car app for Android is built to move most of that work onto your phone before you reach the lot, so the pickup itself takes less time. It is published by The Hertz Corporation and costs nothing to install.

The app has been on Google Play since April 2019 and carries a 4.7 average from more than 51,000 ratings, with over a million installs.

What I like about the idea is that it targets the boring parts of rental travel rather than the fun parts. Business trips, family vacations and one-off weekend hires all involve the same admin, and the app's job is to shrink it. Whether that matters to you depends on how often you rent and whether you already have a Hertz account.

Managing a reservation without standing at a counter

The core of the app is reservation management. You can reserve a car, change an existing booking and review what you have booked, all from the phone. The developer describes the process as a matter of a few swipes, and the aim is to keep you out of the line at the location.

Log-in is pitched as one-touch, which matters more than it sounds. Rental apps are used in bursts, often weeks apart, and anything that makes signing back in a chore is a reason not to bother. A quick log-in is the difference between changing a pickup time on the couch and doing it at the desk.

Repeat renters get saved searches. If you book the same class of vehicle from the same airport twice a year, having those parameters remembered saves you rebuilding the search each time. It is a small feature, but it is the one that turns a booking from a five-minute job into a one-minute one.

Once you are signed in, upcoming reservations appear at log-in, and the app keeps a full history of your Hertz rentals. That history is useful beyond nostalgia: the developer notes it can help with expense reports, which is a real consideration if you rent for work and have to account for each trip later.

Locations, rewards and stored payment details

The location finder covers Hertz branches worldwide. Each listing includes opening hours, contact details and directions, so you can check whether a branch is open when you land or how far it is from where you are staying. For anyone renting in an unfamiliar city, that combination is often the first thing they need.

Gold+ Rewards is woven through the app rather than bolted on. Members earn points on rentals and can redeem, request or exchange them toward car rental, which the developer says can add up to free rental days, upgrades and other travel benefits. Joining is free inside the app, so there is no separate sign-up detour.

Member details and points sit together on one screen. That is the sort of thing you want to check at a glance before a trip, and it saves digging through emails for a membership number. Gold+ was named the best car rental rewards program by FlyerTalk in 2020, a claim worth treating as marketing but a signal of how the program is regarded by frequent travelers.

Payment methods can be saved, modified and updated in the app, and the developer explicitly mentions keeping separate work and personal cards on file. If you rent for both reasons, that separation is convenient: you pick the right card at booking instead of sorting it out afterward.

What the app asks of you

The app is free to download, with no ads and no in-app purchases. There is no paid tier to weigh against a free one, which keeps the decision simple.

What it does require is a Hertz relationship. Reservations, history, saved searches and payment methods all live behind a log-in, and the rewards features only make sense if you are a Gold+ member. Signing up is free in the app, but it is still a step.

The rewards side only pays off with repeat rentals. Points accumulate over time, so a single annual rental will not move the needle much. If you rent several times a year, the balance builds; if you rent once, the program is background noise.

The app is also tied to one brand. It is a Hertz tool for Hertz bookings, not a comparison service, so it will not help you weigh Hertz against another company. That is not a flaw so much as the shape of the thing: it is built for people who have already decided, or are likely to decide, to rent from Hertz.

Getting the most out of it before a trip

The most useful habit is to set things up before you travel rather than at the airport. Sign in, check that your payment method is current, and look at your upcoming reservation while you still have time to change it. Doing this the night before a flight is far less stressful than doing it at a counter with a queue behind you.

If you rent regularly, save your searches. Reusing the same parameters for the same city and vehicle type removes most of the typing from a repeat booking, and it means fewer chances to mistype a date. It also makes a quick price check on a future trip almost effortless.

Keep an eye on your points balance in the profile screen. Since points can be redeemed, requested or exchanged toward rentals, knowing what you have is what lets you decide whether to put them toward the next booking. Members who never open that screen are the ones who forget the balance exists.

For work travel, the rental history is worth a look at the end of a trip. Having past bookings in one place makes expense reporting less of a scramble, and it saves you reconstructing dates from a credit card statement weeks later. The recent update, described as work on stability, performance and reliability, suggests the developer is still tending to the app rather than leaving it as it was.

A booking tool for regular Hertz customers

The Hertz Rent-a-Car app is a focused tool: it books, changes and reviews Hertz rentals, finds branches, and manages Gold+ Rewards and payment details. It does those jobs without ads or purchases getting in the way, and it is free.

I would point it at people who rent from Hertz more than once in a while, especially those who travel for work and need a clean record of past bookings. The rewards program rewards frequency, and the saved searches reward repetition. Travelers who book a car once every few years will find less here to justify keeping it installed.

For the audience it is built for, the app covers the practical essentials in one place, and the ratings suggest a lot of renters agree. If Hertz is already your default, installing it is an easy call.

What's new in version 5.6.0

This update is part of our continuous improvement based on user feedback to improve stability, performance and reliability