What travel guides are best

The best ones I purchase are on the liquidation table at our local library--$2.00. Often they're Rick Steves, Lonely Planet or Fodors. I also buy guides from Amazon.com used.

While they may not always be completely up to date, mostly the prices are all that's out of date.

Do plenty of online research in advance. Copy and paste the info you want into a document. Then just print the document. Carrying guidebooks is really a pain as they are not built for travel, but for planning. Or, photocopy maps from books you have purchased for walking tours. You can also build your own maps on Google Maps and print those as well. Doing thorough internet searches in advance can be the biggest help. And do not worry about "missing out". You will miss out on more than you see. You cannot hope to cover it all properly. Choose the things that are most important to you and you will have a more satisfying trip than following a trip that others have enjoyed.

I have several RS pocket guides and have found them very useful. Their small size, the self guided walking tours, maps, etc are useful and I find easy to carry. I also have some RS country guides on my Kindle and they're fine for pretrip reading but not real useful when actually out sight seeing.

I too buy used travel guides of several brands either through Amazon or local thrift stores. They are useful for pretrip research and I have no problem ripping out pages I want to take with me. The one drawback to them is the info may have changed - ticket prices, hours, restaurants no longer in business. Before I buy a new one I look at its publishing date and consider whether it's likely to be reissued prior to my departure. RS updates theirs about every two years.

I, too, have several Rick Steves Pocket guide books (including Rome) and have found them adequate for a 3-5 night stay in a city. I read them at home, use a highlighter and sticky arrow tabs for things we especially want to take in, and I make notes on the fold-out maps. The self-guided walking tours are great. We have also found the RS Italian pocket guide quite useful. Prior to our trips, I borrow the full country guide books from the public library and have never wished that I had taken one along on the trip.

If you go to the store where the RS Guidebooks are sold and click on either a Venice, Florence or Rome Pocket Guide, the scroll down a little to "Is This the Right Book for Me?"

you can see a comparison between what is covered in each format. For example in the Florence Pocket Guide the tab reads:

What's the difference between this Pocket guide and Rick's Florence &
Tuscany guidebook?

Rick Steves Pocket Florence works best for people taking a short trip,
or perhaps a return trip, to Florence. Like our other Pocket guides,
Pocket Florence is smaller than the complete guidebook (and in full
color), but still offers our best sightseeing advice, a handful of
self-guided city walks and museum tours, and a foldout map.

For travelers who want to delve deep into Florence, or travel
elsewhere in Tuscany, the full-size Rick Steves Florence & Tuscany
guidebook is a better option. It offers complete chapters for plenty
more Tuscan destinations, as well as more substantial (and more
frequently updated) advice on Florence itself: practicalities,
sightseeing, self-guided tours, hotels, restaurants, nightlife,
shopping, kids' activities, and the city's history and culture.

You can do that with any book, and get the company's view on which is best in your situation.

The tab immediately below gives up to the minute updates, very helpful because any book is out of date before it is printed. This is a good place to check for those irritating little changes than can make a difference to your trip...

The bigger books do have more content, but it is meant to be an either/or decision, with no need for you to have both.

I was Googling the late, great Access guides, and found this article with a picture of Rick Steves with Arthur Frommer and his daughter:

https://techland.time.com/2013/03/25/print-travel-books-are-dead-and-theres-no-good-replacement/

As Rick encourages, tear out the sections that are going to be relevant to your travels rather than carrying the entire book.

Digital downloads are also convenient if you are carrying a tablet on your trip. Moment of panic in Belgium 4 years ago, left my well annotated and highlighted book in a taxi. Downloaded digital version upon arrival at the hotel (I can't do much without a guide book, your results may vary!).

None of us wish to waste money, but considering the cost of these trips, $14 is pretty inconsequential.