Is RVing a good family vacation? Short answer: Yes. If you’re traveling with kids, a family RV vacation is truly one of the best and most accessible ways to see and experience the world. RV travel helps you keep costs low while expanding your vacation options. Combining flexibility and familiarity, RVing is perfect for traveling with kids.
In this article, we’ll walk you through the benefits of RV travel with kids, including the ways it wins over traditional travel styles (i.e., airplanes, hotels and car-based road trips) for fun family getaways. We’ll also dive into all the tips and tricks you need to pull it off right, right from the get-go.
What Makes RV Travel Ideal for Families?
If you’ve ever sat on an airplane with a cranky kid, you already know one of the most significant benefits of family RV travel: never, ever having to do that again.
But there are other built-in features of RV road trips that lend themselves extremely well to those traveling with kiddos. These include:
- A flexible, DIY schedule. No waiting around for takeoff time.
- A built-in kitchen to help keep even the pickiest eaters satisfied.
- Shared space, perfect for bonding, but with just enough privacy, too.
- Plenty of storage space to bring all the toys and gear your kids need to keep it together on the road.
Sounds pretty great, right?
RV vs Traditional Family Vacations
Here’s a side-by-side comparison so you can see how RV family vacations stack up with traditional family vacations on every level — followed by a more in-depth breakdown below.
| RVs | Hotels and Flights | |
| Privacy | High: No need to use public restrooms or wander through hotel hallways | Low: Airports, hotels, and other shared spaces are key to the experience |
| Flexibility | High: Leave and return whenever makes sense for you | Low: Your schedule is dictated by the airline |
| Kid-Friendliness | High: Room to stow their stuff; a familiar environment day-to-day to keep them calm | Low: Keeping kids entertained in airports and planes can be challenging and miserable |
| Meal-Planning Ability | High: You have your very own kitchen along for the ride! | Low: You’re likely going to have to rely on expensive airport snacks and restaurant meals throughout your stay |
| Stress | Medium: All travel does come with some stress, though RVing keeps levels relatively low | High: From arriving up to three hours before your flight to facing delays you can’t control, airports and stress go hand in hand |
And as we’ll prove below, no matter what kind of accommodations you’re flying to, staying in an RV still has ‘em licked for family travel.
RV vs Hotels
For most families, the very first type of accommodation they’ll consider for vacation is a standard hotel room. And while it’s nice to have someone make your bed while you’re on your trip, hotels leave a lot to be desired compared to RVs in terms of space, privacy, convenience, and cost control.
Hotels are often subject to surge pricing, especially if you’re traveling during a high-demand event. And, of course, if your kids are old enough to really demand their own space, you’re looking at possibly paying for two rooms. Those costs can add up quickly, and you’ll be lucky if breakfast is included — and totally on your own for the other two meals of the day.
RV vs Vacation Rentals
Vacation rentals are another popular option, and since many are offered out of traditional home structures, they can definitely help on the space and privacy fronts.
But compared to an RV, even an “affordable” vacation rental is usually far more expensive than even the nicest rental rig, especially once you factor in pesky hidden fees like taxes or cleaning.
RV vs Resorts
For some families, the resort lifestyle feels like an accessible way to access a vacation where everything’s already been thought about for you. That can be a major relief for busy parents.
But it can also mean giving up freedom in exchange for structure — and activities that can, put plainly, get old after a while. When you stay at an RV campground, you can enjoy resort-style amenities while maintaining total control over your itinerary and daily schedule. Plus, it’s usually more affordable. Talk about a win-win.
Key Benefits of RV Travel with Kids
So what features, specifically, make RV travel so perfect for families? Here are our favorite benefits of RV travel with children.
Less Stress, More Flexibility
If you’re a busy parent, there’s one thing you know you need in every successful day: more flexibility. More flexibility basically automatically means less stress, and an RV brings both wishes to life.
For example, say you have a 12:30 p.m. flight, but your kid’s naptime is usually 11 a.m. From the very start, with the traditional vacation, you know you’re set up for a midair tantrum. But when you rent a motorhome, you can simply leave early enough to have the kid asleep on the road. RVing unlocks options like that all day long.
Familiar Environment for Younger Kids
If you’ve got little little ones around, you already know that keeping to a familiar routine and surroundings can go a long way toward avoiding a meltdown. RVing means you don’t have to shift between different hotel rooms or even from car to room — the car and the room are the same thing!
Built-In Entertainment
Most RVs have TVs built right into their living rooms, not to mention the fact that they unlock outdoor recreation so that the entire world becomes your family’s backyard. Campgrounds are often set up with playgrounds, swimming pools, and other fun outdoorsy to-dos, along with the trails and natural settings that you’ll likely be exploring at your destination.
Is RV Travel Affordable for Families?
All the benefits we’ve mentioned so far are all well and good, but for most families, there’s one factor that matters the very most. And that’s cost.
The good news is, RVing offers savings across a wide range of areas. When you rent an RV, you’ll spend less on:
- Meals, since you’ll be able to make plenty of your own from scratch at “home”
- Lodging, since campgrounds tend to be so much less than hotels (even after the cost of a rental RV, it usually works out in your favor)
- Entertainment, since you’ll have plenty of fun things to do onboard and access to the great outdoors as well
In fact, we actually did a step-by-step cost breakdown of RV travel costs as compared to hotels and vacation home rentals, and RVing came out on top by a landslide.
For a seven-night trip with two adults and two kids 300 miles from home, traveling by RV came out to $1,166 altogether, compared to $2,398.50 for hotel stays and $2,698.50 for a vacation rental. That means RVing cost less than half of the next-cheapest option.
Tips for Planning Your First Family RV Trip
No matter how you slice it, we’ll stand behind our conviction that RVing is the perfect way to travel with family, but it’s true that planning correctly can help you make the best of this unique travel lifestyle. Here are our top three tips for planning your first-ever family RV vacation.
Choose the Right RV Size
One of the biggest benefits of RVs, especially on the peer-to-peer rental market, is that they come in a wide variety of shapes and sizes. Of course, that also means that there’s a lot to choose from, which can be overwhelming for beginners.
For families with small children, we recommend a Class C motorhome, which gives you a good combination of space, privacy, and ease of use. We’ll dive into this a little bit more deeply in the next section, but also know that you’ll be able to see how many people an RV comfortably sleeps right in the rental listing.
Plan Simple Meals
Parents already know that having meals locked and loaded ahead of time can save a lot of stress when hungry bellies start rumbling. Get ahead of your meal prep before the trip begins, and perhaps even prepare a few simple go-tos so you won’t have to spend too much time in your mobile kitchen.
Keep a Flexible Itinerary
Having things to do on vacation is important, but when you’re traveling with kids, negative space is everything, too. Strike a balance between making sure you check the boxes you absolutely don’t want to miss out on while also providing plenty of time for the inevitable last-minute adventures that’ll come up.
Best Types of RVs for Families
So, with all the various types of RVs out there and different RV classes, which is the best for traveling families with children?
For starters, you can break RVs down into two main categories: motorhomes (which you drive) and travel trailers (which you tow behind a separate vehicle, usually a pickup truck).
For families looking for the all-inclusive ease of a motorhome, we recommend a Class C motorhome, whose above-chassis “attic” space is often a great sleeping area for children (or, sometimes, extra storage for their gear). Because they’re built into standard pickup truck chassis, they can also be among the easiest for beginner RVers to drive.
Travel trailers can also be a great option for families who have access to a tow vehicle. Along with being affordable, they also provide a high level of customizability: You can rent (or buy) a pop-up camper with canvas sides or an enormous fifth-wheel travel trailer, depending on the size of your family and your travel wishes.
In any case, a bunkhouse layout often offers the most sleeping space for bigger families, besides being just plain fun for the kids.
Why RVshare Makes Family Travel Easier
When you rent on the peer-to-peer market at RVshare, you’ll have access to the largest selection of RV types and sizes on the market, along with flexible booking, direct communication with RV owners, and support and protection along the way. Our mission is to take care of all the logistics so you can focus on the important part: making once-in-a-lifetime memories with your family.
RVing truly takes the stress out of travel for parents and unlocks the opportunity to enjoy peaceful and unforgettable experiences with your kids. Start building tomorrow’s memories today — and find the RV rental that’ll set the backdrop.
