We've installed and uninstalled a lot of apps over the last few years trying to find the ones that genuinely make travel easier for blind and low-vision users. Here's the current short list — what we actually use, what we've stopped using, and what we wish existed.
The essentials
Aira
Aira connects you to a sighted professional agent via your phone's camera. The agent can see what you see and talk you through it — reading menus, finding the right gate, navigating an unfamiliar hotel lobby.
It's a paid subscription, but here's the move: most major US airports, and a growing number of international ones (including Heathrow), offer free Aira minutes when you're in the airport. Restaurants like Starbucks and stores like Walgreens also offer free Aira at their locations. We've found Aira to be the single most useful tool for unfamiliar travel environments.
Best for: situations where you need a sighted person right now, no waiting.
Be My Eyes
Free, volunteer-based, and surprisingly fast. You request help and within 30 seconds usually a volunteer answers. The Be My AI feature, powered by GPT-4, lets you take a photo and get an AI-generated description — often more detailed than asking a human because the AI doesn't get embarrassed about reading every word on a long sign.
Best for: quick one-off questions and reading long-form text like menus or pamphlets.
Seeing AI
Microsoft's free image-recognition app. The "Short Text" mode reads text in your camera's field of view in real time — fast enough to scan a hotel hallway for room numbers as you walk past. The "Currency" mode identifies banknotes from over 30 currencies, which is genuinely useful when you're handed unfamiliar money.
Best for: reading signs, identifying currency, scene descriptions, and barcode scanning.
Google Lookout
Android's equivalent of Seeing AI, with a similar set of modes. If you're on Android, this is the default starting point. It's improved meaningfully in the last 18 months and handles document reading better than it used to.
For navigation
BlindSquare
A GPS app designed specifically for blind users. Instead of turn-by-turn directions like Google Maps, BlindSquare announces what's around you as you move — "café on the left, 30 feet," "intersection ahead" — letting you build a mental map.
It's pricey (one-time purchase, around $40), but it's the gold standard for orientation in unfamiliar areas. We use it for exploring new neighborhoods rather than for getting from point A to point B.
Soundscape (now community-maintained)
Microsoft discontinued the original Soundscape app, but a community team picked it up and re-released it. It uses spatial audio — you hear nearby points of interest as if they're coming from the direction they're located. Combine with bone-conduction headphones for a hands-free experience that doesn't block environmental sound.
Google Maps with VoiceOver
For straightforward navigation, Google Maps is now genuinely usable with VoiceOver. Walking directions announce turns, distance to next turn, and remaining distance. Indoor maps work in many large airports and shopping centers. Not designed for blind users primarily, but reliable enough to depend on.
For travel planning and booking
Luma
We're biased — but Luma is the only travel app we've found that was designed VoiceOver-first from the start, not retrofitted later. Voice search lets you say "flights from Berlin to Tokyo next Friday" and skip the form. AI image descriptions for products and listings.
Major airline apps (Lufthansa, Delta, United, BA)
These have all reached "actually usable with VoiceOver" status in the last 18 months. Real-time gate changes, accessibility-request management, baggage tracking. Use these instead of relying on PA announcements at airports.
Hopper for flight prices
Decent VoiceOver support and the price-prediction feature is genuinely useful. We use it for monitoring fares but not for the final booking — we usually book direct with the airline once Hopper tells us prices have hit our target.
For at the destination
Apple Maps "Detailed City Experience"
In about 30 cities (Tokyo, London, Berlin, Paris, San Francisco, and growing), Apple Maps has a hyper-detailed pedestrian view with lane-level intersections and elevation cues. Walking directions in these cities are noticeably better than Google Maps for blind users.
WhatsApp Translate
Not a "blind app" specifically, but the live translation feature — you speak, it translates and reads the translation aloud — is the most natural way we've found to handle hotel and restaurant interactions in languages we don't speak. Pair with Be My Eyes for the times you also need visual help.
Aware (currency-converter)
Excellent VoiceOver support, works offline once rates are cached, and the gestures are minimal. Worth installing for any international trip.
What we've stopped using
Apps that promised audio descriptions of tourist sites usually underdeliver — the descriptions are generic and mostly cribbed from Wikipedia. Aira at the actual site, or a guidebook read with VoiceOver, has been better.
Specialized "accessibility-focused" hotel-booking apps haven't worked out for us. The good ones don't have enough inventory; the ones with inventory aren't actually rigorous about accessibility. Better to book through standard channels (Booking.com, hotel direct) and verify by emailing the hotel directly.
What we wish existed
A unified app for accessibility info about specific venues — hotels, restaurants, museums, attractions — with crowdsourced reports rather than self-reported claims. Wheelmap.org tries to be this for wheelchair users (and is genuinely useful in major European cities), but coverage is uneven and there's no equivalent for blind users.
We'd also love better real-time accessibility info for transit — which elevators are out at this exact moment, where is the wheelchair-accessible carriage on this train, is the platform gap actually navigable today. Some agencies have this internally but don't expose it to riders. Berlin's BVG comes closest.
That gap — between accessibility data that exists somewhere and accessibility data travelers can use — is most of what we work on at Luma.