Yeah, “free travel” sounds like something you’d see in a scam or a sketchy headline, but I’ve used this exact method to travel to places like San Francisco for a full week and Chicago for a few days without paying for flights or hotels, and even getting multiple meals paid for. And the best part is that this isn’t limited to one major, one school, or one type of student.

I’ve found that this method really helps to scratch that travel itch that hits during the school year. Anyways, I’m talking too much, so let’s get into it!

Step 1: Be a College Student

Yes, it’s in the title, but I wanted to mention it again because this exact method won’t work unless you’re a university student. The important thing is that you have access to university clubs.

The good news is that it doesn’t matter what you’re studying. While some majors might have more built-in travel, you can make this work in almost any field if you’re intentional about it. You might miss a few classes, but in most cases, your school will excuse absences for academic travel, so you won’t get penalized, which really helps out as a student!

Step 2: Research Opportunities

So once you’re a college student, it’s time for you to start researching opportunities to travel through your school. There’s usually a lot of options, but it’s only the more obvious options that cost money. Sometimes those options (such as travel abroad) are more expensive than just traveleing there (because of tuition costs) unless you get a scholarship to cover it, which can be worth a try but are usually very difficult to get.

Here’s exactly how to find them:

1. Look through your school’s club directory
2. Identify clubs tied to competitions
3. Search:
   “{Competition Name} Nationals [Current Year] Location”

This search will tell you not only if there is a national competition, but where the nationals will be. Then you can decide if it’s somewhere you want to go or if you need to keep searching for other clubs.

Then, reach out to the club president or advisor and ask:

• Do you attend nationals?
• Are travel costs covered by the school?

In many cases, you’ll find:

• A small club fee (usually $15–$50) will be required to buy you a t-shirt, and help buy food for the club meetings.
• The school covers flights, hotels, and sometimes meals for nationals.

Always confirm this before fully commiting, but this setup is very common, and it’s likely you’ll be able to find travel opportunities this way.

Step 3: Plan Your Schedule Carefully

If you’re going to take advantage of multiple clubs (and therefore trips) in one semester/school year, make sure that you organize yourself and get all the dates written down.

And by this, I don’t just mean that you should look at the dates for nationals. You need to look at the state/regional competition dates, the regular meeting times/days leading up to the competition, and also obviously the national competition days. Make sure that none of them overlap. (I’ve learned this the hard way, and it was hard to have to not go to state for another club because I was busy at nationals.)

A lot of opportunities happen in the same season, and if you’re not careful, you’ll have to choose between trips (and awkwardly have to tell the advisor/presidency that you have to miss the competition.)

Step 4: Join the clubs/competition groups

Once you’ve figured out your schedule and made sure that you can make it to everything you need to, join the clubs! Participate as much as you realistically can.

The good news:

• Most of these clubs are low-commitment
• Meetings are usually once a week
• There’s often free food (which is a bonus in itself)

You don’t need to be the best, but you just need to be involved enough to compete and be a part of the team. Even if you’re only doing it for a free trip, you need to be respectful because they are paying for it for you!

Step 5: Prepare well for State/Regionals (this is easier than you think)

This doesn’t take as much time or effort as you might think, and it’s well worth this labor to get a free trip (at least if you’re in a similar financial situation to me.)

The trick is that you need to use your state or regional competition to qualify for nationals, or else you can’t go (obviously.) So, you need to prepare well. Take the time and effort to do well.

A very, very helpful trick is that when it’s a competition where there’s lots of different “events” you can compete in, compete in multiple if you’re allowed to and try to choose the ones that there’s likely less people trying for. Do one of the “team events” or one of the events that requires a presentation, because there are way less people who compete in those ones, making it a lot easier for you to qualify for nationals.

I promise, it’s not as hard as it seems.

Once you get to nationals, you can just enjoy your trip and not stress too much about winning nationals. Ironically, I was always more excited when I qualified for nationals than when I won nationals.

Step 6: Enjoy your trip

Yes, the school is paying for you to be there for the competition, so make sure you’re showing up to everything you need to for that. Doing so won’t take up all of your time, though. You’ll have plenty of time to go explore!

One thing that helps is to plan a lot before the trip. Figure out what times you have to be at the conference center where the competition is taking place, and then plan between those times to go travel around the area. When I was in San Fransisco, I had so much time to go explore the beaches, the golden gate bridge, try a hole-in-the-wall donut shop, go to the Japanese Tea Garden, museums galore, and even walk down the super aesthetic street where the Painted Ladies Houses are. It was so great, but I wouldn’t have been able to do so much in that time if I hadn’t prepared accordingly.

Even with a busy event, you’ll usually have plenty of time to explore if you’re intentional.

Bonus: Clubs That Commonly Offer Free Travel (U.S.)

The specific clubs I’ve joined that I’ve gotten trips from are FBLA collegiate and DECA collegiate. These are both general business competitions.

Business Clubs/Competitions for free travel

If you’re interested at all in Sales, there are usually clubs that travel a LOT for that, so check those out. If you’re school has an American Marketing Association, they’ll usually have national competitions as well if you’re into marketing.

Some non-business degree opportunities include:

Engineering Clubs/Competitions for free travel

The SAE International Collegiate Design Series, American Society of Civil Engineers, American Solar Challenge, or the NASA Human Exploration Rover Challenge.

Science Clubs/Competitions for free travel

The National Conference on Undergraduate Research, American Chemical Society, American Society for Microbiology, or the Society for Neuroscience.

Design/Architecture/Art Clubs/competitions for free travel

The American Institute of Architecture Students, AIGA, Adobe Creative Jam, or the 48 Hour Film Project.

Other degrees

I’ll be writing another article soon with an all-inclusive list of competitions from my research if your degree isn’t listed here, so stay tuned for that! Remember that you can do your own research to figure it out!

How to travel for free as a college student

This isn’t a “scammy” hack, just something most students don’t realize exists. I promise it feels natural and just exciting when you do it.

Basically, if you look for the right opportunites, ask the right questions, and put a small anount of effort in, you’ll read the rewards of travel with little-to-no cost.

So, what are you waiting for? Start following this process and get some free travel as a student!

Plus, check out my other content for more travel tips like this! Check out my tips for traveling as a student, or read about my experience using this method myself to travel to San Fransisco!