You can use Roadtrippers to find a great place to camp either along a planned route or in a general area without planning a trip! Use the Places to Camp or Campendium category on the desktop site to do some planning in advance or in the mobile app to find spots while on the road.
Scroll through this article to learn more about using categories and filters to find great places to park your RV or pitch a tent! Or click a title in the list below to jump to a section:
- Places to Camp versus Campendium
- Explore camping on the map
- Find camping along a trip route
- Filtering camping results (including finding free and dispersed camping)
Places to Camp vs. Campendium
We offer two category options to help you find a great place to camp! Our Places to Camp category (campfire icon) shows both RV camping and tent camping options.
Our Campendium category (trailer icon) is our RV focused camping layer, showing RV camping opportunities, RV dump stations, and overnight RV parking (Premium membership required). If you've used Campendium before, this category will offer a similar experience to the one you're already familiar with!
When you use the Campendium category, you'll notice color coded pins for different types of places. To view a legend of what each color means, see our guide here.
Explore Camping on the Map
Click the website or mobile app tabs below to learn more about how to view camping on the map. Whether you use the website or mobile app, there are a couple things to keep in mind:
- The camping locations shown are determined by the part of the map you're viewing and any filters you've applied.
- There is a limit to how many places will appear on the map at once - so the more you zoom in, the more places you will see in a given area.
You can open the Roadtrippers map to search for a place to camp where you want to be! Zoom and pan the map or use the search bar to browse in or near a specific city or point of interest.
If you're starting from the Roadtrippers homepage on web, toggle to the Explore Destinations tab and enter a city or destination. Tap GO and you'll be taken to that area on our map.
Once on the map, turn on the Places to Camp or Campendium category to view camping locations on the map.
If you're using the Roadtrippers app, tap the Map tab at the bottom of the screen. Zoom and pan the map or use the search bar to browse in or near a specific city or point of interest.
Then, tap in the search bar and select Places to Camp or Campendium from the list:
Find Camping Along Your Route
If you've planned a trip with Roadtrippers, you can find camping along that trip's route and you can use our route shade feature to choose how far off that route you want to look for camping options!
If you want to learn more about starting trip on Roadtrippers, see our guides:
Once you've added a few waypoints to your trip, you can search for camping along that route. With your trip on the map, tap the Explore tab or Explore from the website header. Now apply the Places to Camp or Campendium category:
If you're using the Roadtrippers app, tap in the search bar then select Places to Camp or Campendium from the list:
When searching along your route, you may notice a "route shade" while viewing your trip on the map. This setting indicates how far off your route you are willing to go to visit places and limits which places load when exploring our categories, like camping, while planning a trip. We have a guide to setting or adjusting your search radius in our guide here.
Filtering For Specific Types of Camping
You can filter campground results further by selecting 'Filters' after turning on the Places to Camp or Campendium categories:
You can filter things like property type, price, amenities, rating, max reported RV length, and discount clubs. Premium members can also filter by reported cellular service and elevation!
Looking for free and/or dispersed camping?
If you're looking free camping and dispersed options apply the Places to Camp category then select 'filters.' Locate the Price slider and slide it all the way to the left to filter to Free. If you only want to see dispersed style free camping, be sure to also apply your preferred property types (BLM, National Forest, etc).
With your preferences applied, tap VIEW __ PLACES. If there are no places to view, don't fret too much! You can still tap NO PLACES FOUND then pan over the map and places will appear based on your filter selections!
If you're looking free camping and dispersed options apply the Campendium category then select 'price.' Slide the Price slider all the way to the left to filter to Free. If you only want to see dispersed style free camping, click Filters and apply Public Land in addition to FREE.
With your preferences applied, tap VIEW __ PLACES. If there are no places to view, don't fret too much! You can still tap NO PLACES FOUND then pan over the map and places will appear based on your filter selections!