The necessity of being organized, productive, and keeping everything in one place are challenges that have to be beaten to make the Digital Nomad lifestyle sustainable. While being a Digital Nomad since 2016, I have found it inevitable to have a list of preferred tech tools & apps that helps in many aspects of life. These aspects range from cloud document storage, personal finance, communication, travel organizing to finding a place to work.
As 2020 proved to the world that working remotely is the future, many of the tools in this list aren’t useful to only Digital Nomads. Whether you are a Digital Nomad, remote worker, business traveler, freelancer, or working from home, you can make use of this list.
In this list, I have collected over 70 tools for 15 aspects of life that I personally use, tried, or have used in the past in addition to a brief description of each one of them:
Travel planning & destinations
TripiIt
A time saving travel organizer that helps automating the creation of itineraries, reminders & more.
Maps.me
Could be the best offline maps app in the market. It has proven useful as an alternative to google maps whenever there is no internet access.
Nomadlist
NomadList provides destination information in addition to many other features. The free version is limited and a paid subscription is required. It won’t provide 100% accurate info since it is based on the members votes.
Teleport
A city comparison tool that includes metrics like quality of life, cost of living, salaries and more, etc. It is more related to expats’ lifestyle but long term nomads can make good use of it.
Coworking Spaces
WorkFrom
A community-built list of worldwide places to work from. It is not limited to coworking spaces, but also cafes and public areas.
Coworker
Could be the biggest coworking spaces directory on the web with the option of buying a monthly global pass to access different spaces.
Finance & money transfer
Payoneer
Provides many convenient ways to get paid as a freelancer or an online business including bank transfers & credit cards. The Payoneer pre-paid master card is a big advantage.
Wise
Formerly, Transferwise. It could be your best option send and receive money wherever you are with amazing exchange rate, covering many countries and different currencies.
XE
For frequest travelers, Xe is one of the most accurate currency converters online. They have recently launched a money transfer service.
Paypal
Maybe it is the most famous money transfer and payment service for individuals and businesses worldwide. The high fees is a big disadvantage though.
Accommodation
Airbnb
One of the world’s biggest apps to find accommodation with millions of hosts worldwide offering accommodation on different scales and price ranges.
Coliving
My #1 choice as an Airbnb alternative for digital nomads. It has many options of accommodation in Coliving Spaces in +50 Countries
Note taking & To-do’s
Google Keep
My personal favorite in this list. It has a simple interface, syncs across web, desktop and phones. It supports many type of notes including image notes that you can instantly create from your phone camera.
Microsoft OneNote
Microsoft’s simple yet powerful note taking app. It supports different types of notes that sync across devices and can be shared.
Notion
Notion is considered as a project management tool too. It is more than just a note taking app. Many teams and individuals use it as a space to share ideas & to collaborate. It can also be used by individuals.
Evernote
A feature rich app that supports different ways to create notes including creating directly from web pages. It is used by many teams and individuals as an idea sharing space.
Apple Notes
The app with the least features in our list, however it is prefered by many iPhone, iPad & mac users. It supports adding short text notes, which can be synchronised using Apple’s iCloud.
Despite not being a note taking app, Pocket is used to save articles, videos and stories from the web or any other app.
Communication
Skype
You may call it old fashioned, however Skype remains in competition as one of the best texting and video calling apps.
Slack
For small remote businesses, professional teams and online communities, Slack is a great app which can be used for free.
Whatsapp
Whatsapp Business
Whatsapp isn’t just a texting app anymore. In addition to the famous whatsapp, Whatsapp Business is a powerful tool to communicate with your leads and existing clients.
Zoom
Just another online meetings service. Due to Covid19, it has become one of the mostly used apps worldwide as numerous businesses turned into using it.
Finding best flights
Kayak
Perfect for airfare comparison in many regions. However, it doesn’t have the same worldwide coverage as skyscanner.
Remote job boards
Freelancing Platforms
Toptal
By claiming that they accept only the top 3% of freelancers after a screening process, they promise projects of world top companies too.
UpWork
The most famous online freelancing platform. Despite being a huge platform, the competition is very high & there are many less serious clients.
Fiverr
The once was a micro-services platform is now a one stop shop for many businesses worldwide. Fiverr has recently introduced Fiverr pro program.
99designs
Exclusively for design projects. Clients can post project requirements or host design contests where freelance designers can bid or participate in.
Freelancer
Another freelancing platform similar to UpWork, however the quality of the projects offered and the rates are generally less.
Skill building and self development
SkillShare
Courses covering topics including Illustration, Design, Photography, Animation, Productivity & many more.
Udacity
Focused on technical and business courses taught by top world experts. This explains the higher cost compared to similar websites.
Linkedin Learning
Formerly, Lynda.com. One of the oldest e-learning websites after being acquired by Linkedin.
International Open Academy
Offes many certified courses. The most highlighted one is the 120-hours certificate TESOL course which is necessary for online English teaching job seekers. Currently, there is an %80 discount on this course.
Productivity & Time tracking
Clockify
The best & simple free time tracking options for freelancers and small team with paid plans for companies and bigger teams.
HubStaff
One of the time tracking and reporting software pioneers. Hubstaff offers more integration features for software development teams.
Boomerang
An email scheduler for Gmail. It is has proven useful for remote workers who work across different time zones.
Travel Insurance for Nomads
Safety Wing
A travel insurance with worldwide coverage and limited coverage for home country visits. They have added cover for Covid19 treatment.
Cloud storage & files
Google Drive
Google Drive is my favorite of all time. With free 15GB of storage and the power of Google docs, it is a great cloud based replacement for desktop office software.
Dropbox
Preferred by many businesses and individuals worldwide. The price tag is a disadvantage though.
WeTransfer
When it comes to sending large files, WeTransfer provides the best experience among other file sharing options.
Project & Task Management
Trello
Trello’s visual boards can be used for personal task management, project management and collaboration with clients or internal teams.
Asana
A project management tool built for small teams. It is more focused on project management compared to Trello although many users find that Trello has a more user friendly interface.
Other tools
Speedtest
Internets speed Testing is a necessity for Digital Nomads. This is a tool that gives the ability to test your connection speed against many servers worldwide.
Fast.com
The speed testing tool developed by Netflix. It has proven to be more reliable than SpeedTest in many cases.
Canva
A web-based design tool with many great templates to create designs such as social media posts, documents, flyers, business cards and even short videos.
Grammarly
An AI writing tool that can help with spelling corrections, suggestions & more while writing emails, documents or messages. The free version is great while the premium version provides more advanced features that can make your life easier.
World Clocks
In case that you another extension for the new tab screen, you can use world clock to dispaly it whenever needed by a simple click to the icon in the browser header.
Stay focused
Another browser extension that helps raising productivity by blocking time-wasting websites
Is there more?
If you use a tool that you believe should be on this list, please let me know in the comments. You can also get in touch via email at info@nomadicmemoir.com, on Facebook, or Instagram. In case there is some task that you use a physical tool for and wanna replace by a digital tool, you can check my minimalist Digital Nomad packing list article.
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I am the creator of Nomadic Memoir and the author of this article :D; Living as a Digital Nomad since 2016; Founder of the remote digital agency, Web Leap Garage. I share my experience as a Digital Nomad. Also tips, destination info, and travel stories.
Solid list of tools! I’m a big fan of Payoneer but I wish it was easier to make payment requests, like in Paypal. I’ll take a look at the other tools too!
I’m so impressed with this list! I pride myself on staying organized,but I didn’t know about some of these!
These are all such excellent tools for staying organized when we plan our trips and while we’re on our trips. Everyone should look at these.
I am curious, what do you think will happen with co-working spaces once we are past the pandemic? Will people flock back because they miss people? Will they stay home because there are so many work away from an office resources?
I don’t think that working from home can be a long-term solution for most remote workers. Coworking spaces provide more than just places to work. They have major advantages that working from home doesn’t offer such as meeting like-minded professionals, expanding the professional network, attending events & being within a working environment.
This is a great and extensive list of resources! Amazing, thank you for this.
Thanks for this list. There were a few sites I didn’t even know about.
I am glad to help. Of course we can never make use of all the tools available, however we can try and choose what works best.
There are so, so many useful places to visit online for help with travel, jobs, and much more. I am familiar with only about 1/3 of these sites, so there is much to discover.
I definitelly cannot work without my notes app, Zoom and Dropbox! I’ll need to check out the other awesome resources you shared. As a freelancer, this is a huge help! Thank you 🙂
I am so impressed with this list.
Such a detailed list! Wow! I had no idea half of the platforms even existed! Great article, I´ll share it with my nomad friend who´s about to emigrate 🙂
This is a very helpful list, and I saw some of the tools that I am using as well. For travel, I also check wotif.com coz there are times that prices on Google, and Agoda, varies versus Wotif (of course I opt for where I could save more!).
what a thorough and extensive list! I saw that you added Notion, which made me all happy, because I use that for everything! Highiy recommended tech! Blessings!