Last Updated on July 3, 2023
With international travel slowly going back to normal in 2022 there has been a flurry of travelers looking for adventure. As exciting as it is to pack your bags and travel to a foreign country, it can be extremely expensive too.
However, the price of accommodation varies depending on where you book it from. This is how you can manipulate a website into giving you a better price. You can use a VPN to change your location and pay less for accommodation. This is a simple life hack that you can use thanks to the benefits that you get from a VPN.
You might be wondering what exactly a VPN is and how it will get you discounts on the price of accommodation. We’re going to be taking a closer look at those details below, as well as the other benefits you can get from using a VPN on your device.
What is a VPN
A VPN, also known as a Virtual Private Network is a cybersecurity tool. It’s mainly used to encrypt your internet connection, which will prevent anyone from seeing what you’re doing on your device. Not even your internet service provider or the government will be able to keep track of your internet traffic or snoop through your browsing history, which makes this the ultimate privacy tool.
This feature also gives you great security when using unsecured WiFi networks, and we’ll talk about this in more detail later on as it’s especially important when you travel. If you’re connected to an unsecured network you need to make sure to use your VPN to encrypt the network to make sure that it’s secure.
The feature that we’re after today though, is the ability to change your virtual location to anywhere in the world. A VPN allows you to connect to a secure global server in a different city or country around the world. Doing so will change your IP address — the unique string of numbers that is used to identify your device on the internet and pinpoint its physical location.
By connecting to one of these global servers your real IP address will be masked, and you will adopt the IP address of the server that you’re connecting to. In simple terms, this means that you will trick websites into thinking that you’re accessing them from elsewhere.
For example, if you’re in the UK you can connect to a server in Thailand. This will trick websites into thinking that you’re accessing them from Thailand. You may even see Thai adverts on your browser instead of the usual ads you would get from the UK. This ability to change your virtual location using a VPN is important, and it gives the user complete control over the websites they can access on the internet, as we’ll see later on.
How Does a VPN Slash Accommodation Prices?
You might be wondering how this cybersecurity tool allows you to get discounted rates on accommodation. The reality is that the websites that allow you to book accommodation — both directly through the company and third-party websites — will manipulate their prices based on your physical location.
These websites will often charge more for the same accommodation if you’re from a foreign country. That’s because they know that tourists will be willing to pay more money when they’re traveling. Worse still, if you’re accessing the website from a first-world country with a strong currency — such as the United States for example — the website will likely charge you even more.
On the other hand, if you’re accessing the website from a third-world country instead you’re more likely to get better prices since they want to ensure that they get sales. If you’re accessing the website locally, you might even get further discounts since locals normally would not overpay for their accommodation in their own country.
The best thing you can do is install a premium VPN on your device and connect to different servers to see how the prices change. In the majority of cases, you will find some big differences in the pricing that is on offer.
It is important that, when refreshing servers to display price differences, you clear your internet history (or use the private browsing/incognito mode) so that you have a fresh slate each time you access the site and do not store cookies.
Other Benefits of Travelling With a VPN
There’s much more to traveling with a VPN than just cheaper accommodation though. For starters, you can get some cheaper flights in the same way as you would get cheaper accommodation.
However, a VPN will also keep your devices safe when you’re using public WiFi hotspots such as the ones you often find at hotels, restaurants, and airports. These hotspots are crucial for international travelers as they provide a cheap and convenient way to get their devices connected to the internet.
However, in the majority of cases, these are unsecured networks, which are a hotbed for cybercriminals looking to take advantage of anyone who’s on the same network through MiTM sniffing attacks. However, if you’re using a VPN your devices will be secured by an encrypted connection. As long as your VPN is active you will be able to use these convenient public WiFi hotspots with peace of mind.
If we use the VPNs ability to change our virtual location we can get other benefits that will help us while we’re traveling. If you love sports then you’ll likely encounter geographical blocking when you try to access your usual sports streaming service from another country.
Even if you’re paying the expensive subscription fees you’ll still be blocked from accessing the website if you’re not in the correct region. You can simply use your VPN to connect to a global server that’s in the correct region and access your streaming service as normal.
Some countries also apply internet censorship. Internet censorship will block some specific websites from being accessed within the country’s borders. Governments have different reasons as to why they use internet censorship, but for the most part, it’s either for religious or political reasons.
You may even find that some of your favorite social media websites have been blocked in some countries. You can use your premium VPN to bypass internet censorship and access all of your favorite websites without running into any obstacles.