Digital RS travel books

Rick's ebooks

Rick's guidebooks are also available as ebooks that can be read on any Apple, Android, Kindle, Nook, or Kobo device, or on your computer. To purchase Rick's ebooks, please visit your favorite digital bookseller and search for "Rick Steves."
https://store.ricksteves.com/shop/guidebooks/best-of

I suspect buying the paper version does not grant access to the digital version

the e-books are sold by outside companies completely separately from the RS Europe company.. No discounts or freebies I'm afraid

I only ask because this way I wouldn’t need to take the entire book
and take up precious luggage space for the books.

Most people just rip out the pages that they need and take those along.

I do all my research ahead of time and find that I am looking at the relevant guidebook pages less and less when traveling. So, what I’ve started to do is just make a list of the sights I don’t want to forget about.

I used to take all the maps from the books too. But I’ve learned that the maps app on my phone works great and so I just rely on that to get me where I need to go.

What you could do is get the digital RS books from the library using the Libby app. I did that a lot - that way you'll have the printed portions you want but also access to the E-books. You can usually keep them out for 3 weeks (make sure your settings say that - I think the default is 2 weeks so you might want to change that).

They are popular so I would try and request them ahead of time. Sometimes it requires a bit of work timing it but it's definitely doable.

What Mardee said. And if you know someone who has already purchased the ebook version, they may be able to share it, depending on the platform. I know Nook offers this.

Also, we take screenshots of relevant maps and sections so we have them on our phones with no need to download or have cell/wifi connection while out and about.

What Mardee said.

I will add. We use the RS walking tours as well as the Eywitness travel tours, and building cut outs. I get digital copies from the library via Libby or Hoopla. For the tours, and building cutouts, I like a paper copy to use while walking around. Since I can't bear to tear a page out, I take a copy of the pages. Then, I can make the map bigger as well.

I am doing this for the first time this year, so we will see how it works out for me. I have created "Notes" with headings by key topic (a neighborhood, a city, etc.) and taken scans with my phone of the relevant pages of the guidebook so I can carry the information to refer to, but can ignore it if I end up not needing it. I plan to delete the notes (they take up a good amount of room) as I go to free up space for pictures. I will have the notes downloaded to my computer to help me when I return with my journal notes, but I think this is a good way to go for this year.

We are headed to four countries so I didn't want to carry books. I also feel like I need multiple book resources for certain places as Rick "curates" a place differently than I might so I want specifics of places he largely ignores.

Good luck with your trip!

I get digital copies from the library via Libby or Hoopla. For the tours, and building cutouts, I like a paper copy to use while walking around. Since I can't bear to tear a page out, I take a copy of the pages. Then, I can make the map bigger as well.

Jules, are you talking about a physical copy of the map? Or digital? What I do is open the digital book on my laptop and take a screenshot of the map, then I insert the screenshot into a Google document (or Word). That way you can make it bigger or smaller and add little notes to it. Once it's final just print out a copy to take. It's sort of a variation on what Rebecca does.

Laura, I did something of the sort - I created individual documents in Google for each destination (i.e., Edinburgh, Skye, Arran, etc.) then added notes, links, and maps to that document. Right before I left, I downloaded them to my phone so that they were easily accessible offline (although I had plenty of data from T-Mobile). Sort of like a mini-guidebook. But I also still pulled up data from my RS library E-book and the Rough Guides.

And by the way, if you buy a paper copy of a Rough Guide book, they give you a digital copy for free. You can't use it on Kindle but I opened mine in Apple Books (or you can use Adobe Digital Reader).

Yes, a physical copy. If I have the digital copy, I get it from there. If I don't I take it from the book. I have to time the digital copies because there are typically waiting lists, and I want to be able to have it for the trip.