Questions worth answering

We scan every campground reservation system every five minutes. When a site that matches your alert opens up, we email you within about a minute. You click the link, you book the site on the reservation site. That’s the whole loop.

Within about a minute of us detecting the opening. After that it’s a race between you and anyone else watching. Popular sites can rebook in minutes, so don’t wait around once the email lands.

You get an email with the campground name, the specific site number, the dates that opened, and a direct link to the booking page. Click the link and complete the reservation there. We never touch your card on the reservation side.

No. That would mean storing your card with every reservation system in the country and racing to book the moment a site opens, which is brittle and easy to get banned for. We send the alert, you handle the booking.

Recreation.gov for federal lands (national parks, forest service, BLM, Corps of Engineers), plus the major state-park reservation systems: ReserveAmerica, US eDirect, and a handful of states running their own platforms. If a US campground takes online reservations, we probably scan it.

Probably yes. Email tim@campcancel.com with the park name and the reservation URL and I’ll look at adding it. The first park in a new system takes a few weeks to integrate; every additional park in that same system after that is fast.

Not yet. For Canadian parks I’d point you at CampNab — they cover that ground well. CampCancel is US-only for now.

Not yet. Backcountry permits live in different parts of the booking systems and would need separate integrations. On the list, not done.

See the pricing page for the current numbers. There’s a small plan for a single park and a bigger plan if you want to watch many parks or set up regional sweeps.

No. Running the scans costs real money in proxy bandwidth and compute, and I’d rather charge a fair price than dress up a short trial that converts to a charge you forgot about.

Yes, any time. Dashboard, then Settings & billing, then cancel. You keep access through the end of the period you already paid for.

Cancellations happen often at popular parks, but I can’t guarantee one will land for your exact dates and site preferences. If you paid for a month and didn’t get anything useful, email tim@campcancel.com and I’ll refund you. No process.

You absolutely could. If your trip is one specific park on one specific weekend and you have the time to sit on the booking page, you don’t need me. Where this earns its keep is multi-park trips, popular weekends, and the times when a cancellation drops at 2:47am while you’re asleep.

Click Sign in in the top nav. Authentication runs through Clerk with an email-based sign-in flow, so there’s no password to remember.

From the dashboard, each alert row has Edit, Pause, and Remove buttons. Paused alerts stop firing until you resume them and don’t count against your plan’s limit.

No. The alert window closes automatically when the dates expire, and the alert moves to your past trips. Reactivate it for a new trip from the dashboard.

Stripe handles every credit-card transaction. CampCancel never sees your card number, just the last four digits and a tokenized reference for billing.

No. We monitor cancellations; we don’t create them. If nobody cancels a site that fits your criteria during your window, no alert comes. Most people running alerts at popular parks during peak season see results, but it’s not magic.

No. We never book a site, never hold inventory, never sell reservations. We send the alert, you book directly with the park. We’re a notification service.

No. CampCancel is an independent service that reads publicly available booking data. We’re not endorsed by Recreation.gov, the National Park Service, or any state parks agency.

Mostly no. Popular parks sell out because demand massively outstrips supply (Yosemite has a few hundred sites and millions of annual visitors). Park systems also prevent transferable reservations, which kills most reseller schemes. The competitive pressure is real campers all hitting Reserve at the same moment.

If their built-in alerts cover what you need, use them. They added this feature in 2023 and it’s free, but it’s limited to a few campgrounds at once and lacks filtering. CampCancel covers broader systems, supports filters by site attributes, and (I’d argue) lands alerts faster.

Cast a wider net. Watch multiple parks in the same region if you’re flexible on location, set a shorter minimum stay (you’ll see more openings), and don’t over-filter. Each filter cuts the result pool. Set the alert up as early as you can; cancellations spike in the weeks before arrival as plans firm up.

Fast. Popular sites can rebook within minutes. If you’re at a computer, click through immediately. If you’re on your phone, the email links go straight to the booking page so you can check out in a few taps.

The two to six weeks before arrival, especially for peak summer weekends and holidays. People’s plans solidify or fall apart in that window. You’ll see lighter activity in shoulder months.

A range if you can. Each extra day in the window gives you another shot at catching a cancellation. Many people set a 7-day window even when their actual trip is 3 days.