Today we're launching TravelTracker.me, and we want to tell you why we built it.
We love traveling. We love preserving those memories. But every travel app we tried came with a catch: they wanted our data as much as we wanted their features. Location tracking running in the background. Analytics pixels watching every click. Data shared with "trusted partners" we never agreed to trust.
So we decided to build something different. A travel journal that actually respects the people who use it.
The Problem With Travel Apps in 2026
Here's what most travel apps know about you:
Your location, when the tracker is on. Apps like Polarsteps and FindPenguins are built around opt-in background GPS tracking. When you enable it for a trip, they can see where you sleep, where you eat, how fast you're moving, and every stop in between. That's a route-recorder, not a journal - and the data lives on someone else's servers.
Your photos, and everything in them. Every photo you upload contains EXIF data: GPS coordinates, timestamps, device info, sometimes even altitude. Upload those to a platform with third-party analytics? That data becomes a product.
Your patterns. When you travel. How often. How much you spend (if you log expenses). Where you like to go. What kind of traveler you are. This is gold for advertisers.
Your identity. Most apps require social logins or collect your email, name, and profile info. Connected to your travel data, this builds a disturbingly complete picture of your life.
And most of this data isn't just stored. It's analyzed, packaged, and shared with advertising networks and analytics companies.
We Take Your Privacy Seriously
You've read this line a hundred times. It's in every privacy policy right before the paragraph that explains how they share your data with third parties. That phrase has become meaningless. It's the corporate equivalent of "no offense, but..." where you know something bad is coming next. Real privacy isn't a policy. It's an architecture choice. It's something you build into the foundation, not something you bolt on after the ad network is already integrated.
What We Built Instead
TravelTracker.me has zero third-party tracking. Not "minimal." Not "privacy-focused." Zero.
Here's what that means:
- No Google Analytics. We don't track what pages you visit, how long you stay, or where you click.
- No Facebook Pixel. We're not feeding your browsing data to Meta's advertising machine.
- No third-party analytics of any kind. No Hotjar. No Mixpanel. No Amplitude. Nothing.
- No ad networks. We'll never show you ads, so we'll never need to profile you.
- No data selling. Your data stays yours. Period.
"But how do you know if people are using your app?"
Honestly? We don't, and that's the way we want it! All we do know is that people sign up, create trips, and sometimes upgrade to the paid plan. That's enough.
Why This Matters
TravelTracker.me isn't backed by venture capital firms who need a 10x return. There's no board of directors pushing for "monetization strategies" that always, somehow, end up meaning "sell user data." We wanted a private place to keep travel memories and become the product. That's it. That's the business model. When there's no investor pressure to grow at all costs, you can make decisions that put users first. Like not tracking them.
What You Get
A travel journal that focuses on what matters:
- Trip journals with photos, stories, and dates, organized and beautiful
- Interactive maps showing everywhere you've been
- 195+ countries, 400+ national parks, 1000+ UNESCO sites to track and explore
- Flexible sharing - private links for people with an account, or public links for anyone, always read-only
- Trip collaboration for when you travel with someone and want to combine your records
The Explorer plan is free and gives you 10 trips and 200MB of photo storage. The Adventurer plan ($9.99/month or $99/year) unlocks unlimited trips, unlimited photos, and collaboration features.
No third-party tracking either way.
Try It Today
The web app, iOS, iPadOS, and Android apps are all live. The Apple TV app is in review. Try it at TravelTracker.me.
If you've been looking for a travel journal that lets you preserve your adventures without the surveillance tax, give it a try. Your memories will be there. Your data won't be anywhere else.
We'd love to hear what you think. We're building this for travelers like you, and your feedback shapes what comes next.
Track Your Travels, Not Your Travelers.
Explore TravelTracker.me features: