Stay Otter vs. Hopper vs. booking trackers: which one fits your trip
By Derek Worth, founder of Stay Otter ·
People ask how Stay Otter compares with Hopper and with the apps that watch a hotel after you book. They solve different problems, and the honest answer is that more than one of them can be right for the same trip. Here's what each one is, what it costs, and when I'd use it. Details are as of October 2026; check each one's own site for changes.
The short version
| Hopper | Booking trackers (Pruvo, StayHawk) | Stay Otter | |
|---|---|---|---|
| What it is | A travel agency app: flights, hotels, rentals, cars | A watch on a stay you already booked | A search that checks places across three sites, then watches them |
| Who you book with | Hopper | Whichever site you used | The site itself (Booking.com, Vrbo, Expedia) |
| How it makes money | Bookings and paid add-ons per trip | Pruvo: affiliate commissions. StayHawk: subscriptions | Affiliate commissions (never in the ranking) and Pro |
| Before you book | Price predictions, deals, a price freeze | Not their job | Verified picks with the street, the walk and the all-in total |
| After you book | Paid flexibility (cancel or change for any reason) | Price-drop alerts while you can still cancel | A free price watch until your deadline, with reminders 7, 3 and 1 days before |
| Best for | Flights, and booking everything in one app | A hotel you already booked | Choosing where to stay, and watching it after |
Hopper
Hopper is a mobile travel agency known for predicting whether flight and hotel prices will rise or fall. You book with Hopper, and it sells extras on top: a price freeze that holds a rate for a fee, and cancel-, change- and leave-for-any-reason protection. When those launched in 2022, Hopper said cancel-for-any-reason on hotels averaged about $30 per reservation. It's good at flights and at keeping a whole trip in one app. Its focus is the deal and the flexibility you pay for, not the neighbourhood.
Booking trackers
Pruvo watches hotel bookings you've already made with free cancellation. You forward the confirmation (or connect Gmail), it checks the price, and when the same room drops it sends a link to rebook; you cancel the original yourself. It's free and earns affiliate commissions when you rebook through it.
StayHawk imports bookings by forwarding or a Chrome extension and sends cancellation-deadline reminders. Its free plan covers five bookings with deadline alerts; daily price monitoring is on its paid Pro plan, which also tracks flights, trains and car rentals.
Both are good at one thing: catching a cheaper rate on a hotel you already chose.
Stay Otter
Stay Otter starts earlier. You tell it where, when, who and what the trip is for; it reads Booking.com, Vrbo and Expedia live, keeps only well-rated places, checks each finalist on the map (the street, what's within a ten-minute walk, the distance to your spot) and shows the picks with the all-in total and the time it was read. It ranks by your criteria and never by commission, and it never books or cancels anything.
After you book, the booked-stay watch is free: forward or paste the confirmation and it reads the rate every morning until your free-cancellation deadline, with reminders a week, three days and a day before. It covers hotels and rentals on Booking.com and Vrbo, Expedia hotels, and hotels booked direct (read across sellers on Google's rate list).
Searches and booked-stay watches are free. Pro ($5.99 a month or $49 a year, free for 30 days with no card) re-runs a search every day and emails you when a verified pick drops 5% or $50. What it doesn't do: flights, Airbnb, or booking on your behalf.
Which one for your trip
- Booking flights, or want one app for everything: Hopper.
- Already booked a hotel and only want the price watched: a tracker works, and so does our free booked-stay watch.
- Still choosing where to stay, especially in a city you don't know: Stay Otter, then let it watch the booking.
Quick answers
- Is Stay Otter like Hopper?
- No. Hopper is a travel agency app that sells flights, hotels and rentals and adds paid extras like price freezes and cancel-for-any-reason. Stay Otter never sells or books anything: it finds and checks places across Booking.com, Vrbo and Expedia and you book on the site itself.
- What does a hotel price tracker do?
- Tools like Pruvo and StayHawk watch a booking you already made with free cancellation and tell you when the same room gets cheaper, so you can rebook and cancel the original. Stay Otter's booked-stay watch does the same, free, and also covers rentals on Booking.com and Vrbo.
- Which is cheapest to use?
- Pruvo is free and funded by affiliate commissions. StayHawk is free for deadline reminders on five bookings and charges for price monitoring. Stay Otter's searches and booked-stay watches are free; Pro is $5.99 a month or $49 a year for daily price-drop alerts on searches. Hopper is free to use but sells paid add-ons per booking.