13 Useful Car Gadgets That Make Road Trips Safer

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Whether you're preparing for your first weekend adventure, or you're a seasoned road trip veteran, it's easy to accumulate a mountain of gear that seems useful for your next adventure. No-one wants to get out on the road and have plans ruined by forgetting to bring a critical piece of kit. However, it's equally possible to go too far the other way and bring far more than you actually need.

To keep car clutter to a minimum, it's always good to take a moment to review your arsenal of road trip gear and gadgets every so often, to make sure it's all still as useful as possible. If some of your go-to gadgets are due an upgrade, or if you're missing a potentially useful gadget altogether, it might be worth investing in one of these safety-enhancing fresh finds.

Offering the additional functionality of a satellite navigation and a dash cam in one device, the Garmin DriveCam 76 makes a versatile road trip companion if you can justify the cost. SlashGear's reviewer tested it out on their own interstate road trip and appreciated its easy setup and clear image quality. It wasn't flawless — for example, its speed limit warning feature wasn't entirely accurate — but, crucially, both its navigation and its dash cam functionality worked without issue.

As standard, the Garmin's camera backs footage up to the onboard SD card, but Garmin also offers a cloud storage subscription for a monthly fee. The SD card slot can handle cards up to 256 GB, but our review unit arrived with a 16 GB card. As a result, the card filled up quickly, with early footage of our road trip being overwritten by the time our reviewer arrived home.

Garmin has several different sizes, but the only model that's available with the built-in camera is the seven-inch model. It doesn't come cheap, and that's perhaps the biggest caveat. The Garmin DriveCam 76 retails for $449.99, although at the time of writing, it's available on Amazon for less than $400.

While many road trip gadgets are niceties over necessities, a good tire inflator like the Syncwire Inflate 190 Tire Inflator sits in the latter camp. Particularly if your car doesn't come with a spare tire, the ability to patch up a puncture and re-inflate a tire at the side of the road is vital to ensuring a road trip goes as planned. We tested the inflator on both car tires and a variety of other inflatables, finding the Syncwire to make inflating all of them an easy task. It can be configured to a target pressure then connected to a tire and left to its own devices, since it automatically shuts off when it reaches that target pressure.

It's capable of inflating up to 150 PSI. The Syncwire Inflate 190 Tire Inflator retails for $43.99, but can regularly be found on sale on Amazon for less. It's a little over five inches long, roughly three inches wide, and two inches high, and so can fit in a glove box or be left in a storage cubby until you need it.

Alongside a tire inflator, a portable jump starter is another item that is essential to ensuring that long road trips don't come to an unexpected halt. There are plenty of good, cheap car battery jump starters out there, but one that caught our eye was the Avapow A07 Portable Jump Starter. It retails for $59.99 and can jump start gas engines up to 7.0L and diesel engines up to 5.5L in displacement. The jump starter is IP65 rated, so can withstand water and dust ingress and thus is suitable for use in adverse weather conditions.

Recharging the battery via a wall outlet takes around four hours, and when it's fully charged, the brand claims that the jump starter can perform up to 40 starts before running out of juice. It's also claimed to hold a charge for up to nine months, and so can be charged and left in a glovebox or tool kit in case of emergencies. In a pinch, it can also be used as a power bank thanks to its USB-A port or a flashlight thanks to its built-in LED array.

Most smartphones have built-in flashlights, but it's always safe to carry a backup in case your phone's battery is running low. The Streamlight 66601 MicroStream Flashlight features a clip that allows it to be attached to a pocket or the brim of a cap. The latter might come in particularly useful if you need both hands free to work on your car when it's dark outside or a little extra illumination to see inside the darkest depths of the engine bay.

The flashlight provides 250 lumens at peak brightness and runs for up to an hour-and-a-half at that level. Its low light setting increases the expected battery life to around three-and-a-half-hours on a full charge, but produces only 50 lumens. It features an integrated rechargeable battery that can be charged via a Micro USB port. While buying a gadget with Micro USB is far from ideal, at least Streamlight includes a Micro USB to USB-A cable with the flashlight — you'll just need to make sure you don't misplace the cable. The flashlight retails for $34.99.

If you're planning on bringing a trailer on your road trip, or you have an older vehicle that lacks modern tech features, it's potentially worth investing in an aftermarket backup camera. Many aftermarket cameras require some kind of intrusive installation, but the EWAY Magnetic Wireless Backup Camera can be attached to vehicles or trailers with no wiring. It runs on battery power and connects to a smartphone via a WiFi connection, so it can be easily attached to and detached from multiple trailers or vehicles.

The connected smartphone serves as the camera screen, so you'll need a suitable phone holder to make full use of its capabilities while driving. If you haven't got one, don't worry — we've got you covered below. The $89.99 camera is IP68 waterproof and offers a 150° field of vision, and just like a factory-installed backup camera, it features distance guidelines to help you see how far away your vehicle is from an object at a glance. While it can operate at a maximum distance of 44 feet, the brand recommends that the phone and camera should not be placed more than 35 feet away from each other.

Another feature often missing from older cars is a tire pressure monitoring system, but aftermarket systems such as the Tymate TM7 Tire Pressure Monitoring System are a cheap alternative. The kit retails for $39.99 and includes four tire-mounted pressure sensors plus a display that plugs into your car's 12V outlet. The display also includes two USB charging ports, one USB-A and one USB-C, so you can still charge small devices using the outlet.

As well as providing a continuous readout of your car or trailer's tire pressures, the display unit will also beep if it detects pressure loss, unusually high temperatures, or a loss of signal from the sensors. It's designed to work with trailers up to 36 feet in length, although a separate repeater is also available from the brand to enable it to work over longer distances. It can detect pressures up to 87 PSI, making it suitable for all common car and truck tires.

Head-up displays are frequently available in modern cars and aim to reduce the amount of time that a driver has to take their eyes off the road. Older or lower-spec cars won't usually have them standard, but the Acecar Head Up Display is a budget-friendly way to give your car the same functionality. It needs to be positioned on the dash so that it reflects upwards towards the windshield, and it will then be able to display basic information like the car's speed and revs. It can also display warning lights for the battery voltage and water temperature.

It retails for $32.99 and is therefore one of the most affordable gadgets on this list, but it isn't without its downsides. It will need to be plugged into a car's OBD-II port, and so will require some careful wire arrangement to ensure you don't have wires awkwardly hanging down while you're driving, and it isn't compatible with all cars.

According to Acecar, it can't be used with Jeep, Fiat, or Suzuki vehicles, and amusingly, the brand notes that it isn't compatible with Lamborghinis either. While that's surely a huge disappointment to all the Lamborghini-owning, road trip-loving gadget fanatics out there, for everyone else, this cheap head-up display might be worth considering.

Buying a dash cam has plenty of benefits, but not everyone wants one for everyday use. A road trip is arguably one of the best journeys for fitting a dash cam, even if you usually prefer to go without one. You'll likely be driving down unfamiliar roads, so you can store footage of particularly interesting drives to look back on, but you'll also have a record of your driving should you get into an accident on your travels. SlashGear tested two budget dash cams to see how they fared as road trip companions, and found that both were more than up to the task.

The Veement V300 Dash Cam was one of our test devices, and it retails for $42.99. It ships with removable adhesive, making it easy to attach to the windshield for occasional trips then remove when you return home. The camera was a mostly plug and play affair, and captured clear footage during our daylight drive. However, it does not ship with an SD card, and so you'll need to buy one separately. Other than that, we found little to dislike about this entry-level dash cam.

Smartphones are a vital tool to help with directions and you keep in contact with your family and friends on trips, but they're no use if they have a flat battery. If you're driving, you'll likely be able to charge your phone via your car's USB or 12V outlet. However, if you have a car full of passengers who may want mobile entertainment, you might not have enough outlets to keep everyone's phones topped up. That's where the Ugreen Magnetic Battery Mini comes in: it's compact, lightweight, and can be kept in a glovebox until it's needed.

Ensuring that everyone's phone is charged before you reach your destination is the easiest way to make sure no-one gets lost if your group splits up after you arrive. The Ugreen Magnetic Battery Mini retails for $54.49 and features a 10,000 mAh capacity, enough to fully charge two iPhones. If you need to top up multiple phones at once, you can charge one phone wirelessly via the magnetic connector and another two using wires with the USB-A and USB-C ports. Since it magnetically attaches to a charging phone, it can also be taken with you on the go. Another useful feature is the built-in kickstand to stand your phone up while it's charging.

The iOttie Easy One Touch 6 Phone Holder retails for $26.95 and is a straightforward way to reduce the amount of time you take your eyes off the road if you rely on your phone for navigation while you're driving. It's compatible with most popular phones and can be attached to either the windshield or dash for maximum versatility. It came out on top in our comparison of Amazon's top car phone holders, with our reviewer finding it to be easy to install and use.

It also stayed secure throughout our test, although it won't be as secure on all dashboards. According to the brand, it's not designed for use on leather or curved dashboards. It's also potentially susceptible to losing adhesive power in extreme heat, but the brand says it can be cleaned with water and dried to rejuvenate its sticking power. It might not offer the charging features of some rival holders, but given its cheapness and decent build quality, our reviewer thought it was well worth the money nonetheless.

Not every would-be road tripper has access to their own car, which means if they want to get on the road, they'll have to borrow one. If you're the generous car owner lending your car out to a friend or family member, you don't have to just blindly trust that they'll be sensible with it. The Bouncie GPS Tracker lets you track the whereabouts of your car while it's not in your possession, and it can also alert you if it's driven at high speed or it brakes or accelerates sharply. It also comes with a geo-fencing feature, so you'll get an alert if the car enters or exits a certain area.

As well as making sure that your borrowed car is being driven safely, the tracker also relays any warning lights or maintenance issues that appear on the car while it's on the road. It's powered via the car's OBD-II port, so there's no need to worry about it running out of battery either. The Bouncie tracker costs $89.99 but to unlock its full features you'll also need to pay a monthly subscription, which at the time of writing costs around $10 a month.

Drivers of smaller, two-row cars can keep an eye on small children in the rear row via a simple mirror, but for drivers of three-row cars, it isn't always as straightforward. The Shynerk Baby Car Mirror Camera is an easy way to monitor children no matter where they're sitting, and it retails for $42.99. The camera can be strapped to the headrest of the car seat to point towards a rear-facing baby seat, then the 4.3-inch monitor can be placed on the car's dashboard so that the driver always has a clear view of their passenger.

That potentially means less time spent peering into a mirror to try and get a clear view of your child, and therefore less time taking your eyes off the road. The camera is designed to work in both day and night driving conditions, and has a 120° field of vision. It's attached to the seat headrest with straps, while the display sits on a non-slip mat, so both can be easily and quickly removed after your trip is over.

If you're going on a road trip somewhere remote, or planning to camp out at your destination, you'll need to bring food with you. A traditional ice-filled cooler might be enough for short road trips, but for longer trips, a safer bet is bringing a powered refrigerator like the BougeRV 23 Quart Portable 12V Car Refrigerator. According to the brand, it can reach 32°F from room temperature in as little as 15 minutes, and it only needs a 12V outlet to run.

The refrigerator can also be run off a wall outlet if needed, and ships with cords for both types of outlet. It also features a freezer mode that can drop the interior temperature as low as -8°F. With an operating noise level of 45dB, it shouldn't be noticeably loud while you're on the road either. At a retail price of $189.99, the refrigerator isn't cheap, but it's potentially a very useful addition to your road trip arsenal, particularly if you bring perishable goods along for the ride.