The Dyrt: RV & Free Camping

Review by eFreeware

The Dyrt is a US camping app from a company of the same name. It brings together campsites of every kind, from public grounds to private RV parks and free spots, in one catalog, while photos and camper reviews make up the community side. The main reason to consider it is that range: instead of keeping a state park list, an RV park list and a note about free spots in separate places, you get them in one app.

It has been on Android since March 2017 and has passed a million installs, with a 4.6 average across more than 34,000 ratings. The download is free, and the app carries ads and offers in-app purchases. A paid membership, PRO, adds a set of tools.

I'd look at it as a planning tool first and a booking tool second. You use it to work out where you want to sleep, compare the options around a lake or a trailhead, and then move toward a reservation. That is a narrower job than a general travel app, and the app is built around doing it well.

What you get in the free app

The catalog is the backbone. The mix is the useful part: you can look at a national park campground, a private RV park and a no-cost option in the same session.

Filters do the sorting. You can narrow results by distance, by rating and by type, which matters when you have a rough area in mind but no fixed site. The photos and reviews come from campers, so the picture you build of a place is closer to what previous visitors saw.

The app is set up for more than tent camping. The developer lists tents, RVs, trailers, cabins and glamping as the kinds of trips it supports, and reservations can be made for sites near lakes, hiking trails and other features. That spread is why the catalog is so large, and also why the filtering matters: without it, the volume would be hard to work through.

The PRO membership and what it adds

PRO is where the app's more specific tools sit. It opens up a set of more than 16,000 free dispersed and overnight parking locations, which is the part that would matter most to someone traveling without hookups or a reservation. The developer also promises alerts that help you get a reservation at a sold-out campground, which addresses a real problem for popular parks in peak season.

There are savings attached as well. PRO includes discounts at over 1,000 campgrounds, described as up to 40 percent off, and no extra booking fees when you book through the app. For anyone booking several nights a year, that combination is the clearest way the membership could pay for itself, though it depends entirely on whether the campgrounds you want are among the participating ones.

Two planning features round it out. A road trip tool finds campgrounds along a driving route, and a drive time tool surfaces options within the distance you are willing to cover in a day. There are also maps for BLM and USFS land and for cell service, which is the kind of detail that decides whether a remote site is workable for you.

Offline use and route planning

Offline mode is a PRO feature, and it is the one I would weigh most heavily. It lets you download the full catalog of more than 50,000 campgrounds along with offline maps, so the information is on the device before you leave. For anyone heading somewhere remote, that changes how the app can be used.

The route tools are built around the same idea of planning ahead. Finding campgrounds along a chosen driving route suits long-distance trips where you want a place to stop roughly every day, and the drive time filter works from how far you are willing to travel rather than from a fixed map area. Together they turn the catalog into something closer to an itinerary.

What I'd keep in mind is that these are planning aids, not navigation. The app helps you decide where to stay and how to break up a drive.

Costs, ads and what the app asks of you

The app is free to download, shows ads and offers in-app purchases, with PRO as the paid tier. PRO covers a fairly long list: free camping spots, reservation alerts, campground discounts, waived booking fees, road trip and drive time tools, land and cell service maps, and offline downloads. If none of those are things you need, the free app still gives you the catalog, the filters and the camper reviews.

The trade-off is that the most useful tools for remote and spontaneous trips sit behind the membership. Free dispersed camping locations, offline maps and the sold-out alerts are all PRO items, and those are precisely the features that help when a trip does not follow a plan. Someone who mostly books established campgrounds in advance will feel that less than someone chasing first-come sites.

The content rating is Teen. Expect the usual variation in quality that comes with that, and treat individual reviews as one camper's account rather than a guarantee.

Campground owners on the other side

There is a second audience here. Campground owners can list their property on The Dyrt and advertise it to the app's visitors. The developer says instant-bookable properties pay no commission, so the owner keeps the full booking amount, which is a straightforward pitch to smaller parks that resent handing over a cut of every reservation.

A listing platform that is attractive to property owners tends to have more inventory, and more inventory is what makes the filtering and comparison useful in the first place.

Who this fits

The Dyrt is for people planning camping trips inside the United States, whether that means a tent weekend near a lake, a trailer loop with hookups or a night in a cabin. If you like to compare several sites before committing, the combination of filters, photos and camper reviews is the part that earns the install.

It also suits RVers and road trippers who want one place to look at private parks, public campgrounds and free options together, and who would use route and drive time tools to string stops into a trip. The PRO tier is aimed at that same group, particularly those who want dispersed camping locations and offline maps.

Someone who camps rarely, always at the same established campground, and books well in advance has less reason to pay for anything here. The free app would still serve as a reference for reviews and photos, but the paid tools are built for people who move around and plan as they go.

A camping catalog worth the download for US trip planning

I'd install The Dyrt if you camp in the US and want public campgrounds, private RV parks and free options in one searchable place. The catalog, the distance, rating and type filters, and the camper-written reviews and photos are the core of it, and they are available without paying.

The decision point is PRO. Free dispersed camping locations, offline downloads of the catalog and maps, reservation alerts for sold-out parks, campground discounts and the route tools all sit in the paid tier, and those are the features that matter most for remote or loosely planned trips.

It is a well-established app with a large user base and a strong rating. For anyone mapping out a season of trips across different kinds of campgrounds, it is a reasonable thing to have on the phone.

What's new in version 6.7.0

We smoothed out a few app hiccups so your adventures stay on track.