Accommodation will always be one of your biggest travel expenses…but what if it wasn’t? What if you could reduce the cost of your accommodation to zero while still enjoying the comforts of home? That’s what house swaps promise. House swaps have been around for decades. It was the entire premise of the movie The Holiday (starring Cameron Diaz and Kate Winslet). They became all the rage but then were soon eclipsed by sites like Airbnb. But as travel prices skyrocketed post-COVID, more and more people have turned back to house swaps as a means of saving money while they travel while still getting a local experience (but without the hassle of an Airbnb). House swaps are exactly what they sound like. You sign up, list your home, and then swap with someone else in another city. They stay in your place and you stay in their place. The biggest and most popular platform for swaps is HomeExchange . And, in this post, I’ll go over everything you need to know to get started with a house swa...
Posted: 3/27/2023 | March 27th, 2023
I’m bad at taking photos. That’s not to say the pictures I take are bad (though there’s debate on that too!). Rather, I always forget to take photos for this blog whenever I’m traveling.
I’ve gotten better in recent years (thanks to the team here constantly reminding me). But that means I take a lot of photos — photos of me for my social media, pictures of landscapes and monuments for the website, menus so I can update prices on the blog, and everything in between.
After over 15 years traveling the world, I have thousands and thousands of pictures on my hard drive.
Literally.
I actually went through all my photos in 2022. It took TWO MONTHS of sorting and arranging them into folders, separating them by date and destination, and removing duplicates and those I didn’t want to keep.
It was a hassle. But it didn’t have to be.
Enter Mylio Photos.
Mylio is an app that makes it easy to save, store, edit, organize, and protect all your travel photos — as well as important documents, like passport scans and visa applications. It’s pretty new and I wish I had found it sooner because it would have saved a lot of time. But, hopefully, it can do that for you!
Mylio is designed to simplify your life as a traveler, so you don’t have to waste time uploading pictures and transferring them from device to device.
If you’re like me and have tons of pictures — ones you want to keep safe and organized — here’s how Mylio can help ensure you don’t lose those travel memories.
What is Mylio?
Mylio is an app that turns your computer, phone, tablet, and/or storage device into a convenient and powerful system for managing a lifetime of memories.
With it, all your photos and videos — from any source — are cataloged into a single library that’s accessible on all your devices.
Did you take photos in Paris on your iPhone but videos on your tablet? With Mylio, they will sync automatically to your laptop, so you don’t have to transfer them. Every photo is available on every device. All the time.
Most travelers (including me, until recently) don’t have a system in place for organizing their photos or keeping them safe from device failure, theft, or loss. We just share some on social media and then dump the rest on a hard drive or in the cloud.
As a result, many travelers struggle to find specific pictures, having to browse multiple folders for the image they need. I can’t count how many times I’ve hunted through folders to find a photo, only to come up empty-handed.
While dumping pictures in the cloud is simple, it’s not exactly the best solution. The disadvantages are worth considering:
- Cloud storage requires you to pay more as you add more photos. Some cloud plans have limited storage.
- Some solutions have nice features on desktop (Adobe Lightroom), but limited ones on mobile devices.
- Some solutions don’t allow syncing between MacOS, iOS, Android, or Windows platforms.
Mylio allows travelers to avoid all these limitations. It’s the simplest way to organize, protect, and preserve your travel photos and videos.
Why Use Mylio?
With Mylio, travelers turn their smartphones, computers, and storage devices into a secure, connected library of photos, videos, and other important documents. Travelers can easily sync their Android, iOS, Windows, and MacOS devices; add cloud storage; and even back up media from Facebook and Instagram.
In a nutshell, here’s what Mylio can do for you:
- Collect: It brings all photos and videos together in a beautiful library, including those taken before “the iPhone era.”
- Select: It cleans up your library, removes duplicates in seconds, tags people, and adds events and places. Keep only the photos you need and want to preserve.
- Protect: It automatically backs everything up to your devices. And if you want to add cloud storage (like Google Drive), Mylio will encrypt everything so the data stays with you and nothing is shared with “Big Brother.”
- Access: No matter which device you work on, updates are automatically synced to reflect changes instantly.
Most importantly, photos and videos stay on each device and are not “kept hostage” in the cloud. Mylio shrinks raw photos to less than 5% of their original file size so your phone/tablet/laptop won’t get filled up — all while preserving full editing capabilities if you want to edit/adjust any photos or videos. (The app protects and preserves the originals for when you need them too. It’s all automatic with no attention needed).
If you do need additional storage beyond your devices, you can also link Mylio to the cloud or to a physical hard drive for additional storage.
And because Mylio stores everything on your devices, the price of Mylio doesn’t go up when users add more files or connect more devices.
Moreover, you can store e-books and PDFs in your Mylio account, allowing you to access reading material offline whenever you need it. This is perfect for those long flights or trips to destinations where Wi-Fi may be unreliable.
How Mylio Works
Once you sign up for an account at mylio.com, you can download the app onto your device(s). Here’s what the dashboard looks like:
You can then start dumping in your photos. You just drag and drop. It’s super straightforward:
Here’s a look at a handful of photos I’ve added so far. Notice how Mylio automatically arranges them by date:
While you can arrange things by folders and albums, the main calendar view will have everything arranged by date as well, so you can see exactly when your pictures were taken.
You can also see exactly where they were taken also:
You can zoom in to see specific destinations within each country too:
This is especially helpful if you can’t remember where you were for certain parts of your trip. You can manually tag any old photos that are not automatically added as well.
And if you need to edit photos before you share them, you can do so directly in Mylio:
And since all your photos are connected, if you edit one on your desktop, it will also be edited on your tablet and smart phone. It’s all linked!
And while Mylio is great for photos, you can also add other documents, such as scans of your passport, visa documents, flight or train tickets, and more, ensuring all your vital travel documents are safe and secure and accessible across all devices.
Mylio has facial recognition too, so once you’ve tagged people a few times, this feature kicks in and allows you to sort and search photos by person — not just place or date.
I tagged myself once and it flagged over a hundred photos with me in it. If you travel with friends or family often, this makes sorting (and finding) pictures much easier, as you can simply type in “mom” or “dad,” and all the pictures tagged with them will pop up.
Who is Mylio For?
Obviously, Mylio is best for travelers who take a large number of pictures — including travel professionals. The safety and accessibility features make it a no-brainer for people working across multiple devices. It makes sharing on social a breeze too.
However, even if you’re just an average traveler, Mylio can help you better sort, save, and organize your photos. The calendar and map-view options make finding and sharing them super simple.
And since it’s cheaper than cloud services like Dropbox, you’re getting a ton of value for even less money!
In short, if you travel often and love taking photos, Mylio is an app worth downloading!
It’s never been easier to take amazing photos of your travels, allowing you to capture and save incredible memories from around the world.
But it’s also never been more tedious to save and organize them safely and securely.
With Mylio, you can not only easily store and save your photos but also edit and access them anytime. And using the geotagging and calendar features, you can easily drift down memory lane any time you want to revisit a trip.
If you want to ensure that your best travel memories are safe and secure, check out Mylio Photos. (This is not an affiliate link btw.)
Book Your Trip: Logistical Tips and Tricks
Book Your Flight
Find a cheap flight by using Skyscanner. It’s my favorite search engine because it searches websites and airlines around the globe so you always know no stone is being left unturned.
Book Your Accommodation
You can book your hostel with Hostelworld. If you want to stay somewhere other than a hostel, use Booking.com as it consistently returns the cheapest rates for guesthouses and hotels.
Don’t Forget Travel Insurance
Travel insurance will protect you against illness, injury, theft, and cancellations. It’s comprehensive protection in case anything goes wrong. I never go on a trip without it as I’ve had to use it many times in the past. My favorite companies that offer the best service and value are:
- SafetyWing (best for everyone)
- Insure My Trip (for those 70 and over)
- Medjet (for additional evacuation coverage)
Want to travel for free?
Travel credit cards allow you to earn points that can be redeemed for free flights and accommodation. They are what keep me traveling so much for so little. Check out my guide to picking the right card and my current favorites to get started and see the latest best deals.
Ready to Book Your Trip?
Check out my resource page for the best companies to use when you travel. I list all the ones I use when I travel. They are the best in class and you can’t go wrong using them on your trip.
The post Mylio: An Amazing Photo Tool for Travelers appeared first on Nomadic Matt's Travel Site.
https://ift.tt/aiEKPpf March 27, 2023 at 07:02PM
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