Tips for Securing a Campsite in a National Park—Even When Fully Booked

Booking campsites in popular U.S. national parks like Yellowstone, Zion, Glacier, and Yosemite can be tough—many summer dates, especially around holidays and weekends, are often fully booked.

Fortunately, Harvest Hosts, a private RV camping network in North America, may have the answer.

They have recently launched a new CampScanner feature, which includes a database of over 200,000 campsites (for both tent camping and RVs) across more than 12,500 campgrounds in over 4,900 parks. This tool allows campers to search for open spots and set alerts for sold-out campgrounds in national and state parks. Users will receive a text when a site opens up, giving them the chance to book it quickly before others do.

“Finding campsites in national and state parks can be quite challenging, particularly in summer,” explains Carrie Price, Harvest Hosts' director of brand marketing. “We aimed to create a service that simplifies the booking process at popular campgrounds, reducing stress for campers. The essence of road travel is spontaneity, and we want to help rekindle the excitement of last-minute trips by providing campers with an easy way to secure sites on the go.”

CampScanner functions by gathering data from Recreation.gov (the government’s centralized national park reservation system), CA.gov (California’s booking platform), and Reserve America (a private campground reservation service) to “scan” for cancellations. It notifies campers when new openings become available at their desired parks during their travel dates. Currently, it covers national parks, state parks, regional parks, and national forests across the U.S. (Price mentioned that CampScanner aims to include Canadian parks in the future, although a timeline has not been established.) In the past, travelers had to check each campsite one by one to find availability.

CampScanner operates on a subscription model with three pricing levels: Basecamp ($39/year), Trailhead ($49/year), and Summit ($79/year). The cost varies based on how frequently scans are conducted (as often as every five minutes) and the number of campgrounds that can be monitored under a single account (up to five campgrounds).