Campspot books the site. CampGuide runs the whole park.
Campspot is the biggest name in this category, and for a park that only sells nights it does the job. CampGuide is the most complete platform built for campgrounds: every area of a park it takes to run one, and every dollar a guest spends landing on the same folio as the site. Here is the whole thing side by side, read from their own site.
Short on time.
- CampGuide covers all 16 areas on the board below. Campspot covers 7, which leaves 6 parts of your park to buy somewhere else.
- Every dollar a guest spends lands on one folio, from the site to the massage to the tee time to the storage lot.
- Campspot is the name most operators know. CampGuide is the platform most operators need once the park sells more than nights.
Compared against Campspot's public site. Reviewed August 2026.
The short version.
Six things operators ask on every call. Ours are answered here. Where only they can answer for their side, the row says to ask them.
| What we're comparing | Campspot | CampGuide |
|---|---|---|
| Best for | Parks that want a proven booking platform | Parks that sell more than nights, and want all of it on one folio |
| Built for | Campgrounds, RV parks and public parks | Campgrounds, RV parks, glamping, cabins, marinas and storage, all the way down |
| What comes with it | Ask which capabilities sit in your tier | We tell you exactly what is included for your park before you sign, in writing |
| Setting it up | Their onboarding team, on their schedule | We configure your park end to end, then hand you the controls to change any of it |
| When something breaks in July | Ask for their response times in season | The founder and the person who wrote the screen |
| Your data if you leave | Ask for the export commitment in writing | Exported on demand, and that does not change on the day you cancel |
areas of a park on the board below, read from their own site
of them CampGuide covers and Campspot does not publish
capabilities live today, from the grid to the storage lot
support tickets to change how a site type works
Every area of a park, side by side.
Read from Campspot's public pages in August 2026, so take this board to your call with them and check it line by line. The same marks on both sides, so you can read across a row and get an answer instead of a sales pitch.
| Area of the park | Campspot | CampGuide |
|---|---|---|
| Reservations and the gridDrag across nights, holds that expire, closures with a reason, best fit placement.CampGuide: Best fit placement and orphan night recovery run on the same grid. | Yes | Yes |
| Rates, fees and demandNightly, weekly and monthly rates, fees by rule, tax split by authority.CampGuide: Demand recommendations that stay inside guardrails you set. | Yes | Yes |
| Housekeeping and work ordersFour turnover states, a lead who signs off, a job that blocks the site from booking.CampGuide: A job that blocks a site cannot be booked over by anyone. | Yes | Yes |
| Camp store, drawer and night auditCharge to the site, count the drawer, close the day so nobody posts into it later.CampGuide: The day closes and locks, and a reopen carries a name. | Yes | Yes |
| Booking page and guest messagesA page that quotes off your live rates, and text, email and app replies on one thread.CampGuide: Text, email, the app and the stay pass on the same thread. | Yes | Yes |
| Long stay, start to finishApplication, deposit authorized, screening, occupancy agreement, meters read at both ends.CampGuide: The application, the agreement and the meter at both ends all live on the reservation. | Partly | Yes |
| Storage tenanciesUnits, agreements, scheduled increases, late fees, dunning, overlock and a lien path.CampGuide: A tenancy with dunning, overlock and a lien path, not recurring billing with a note. | No | Yes |
| Food and beverageMenus with allergens, seasonal versions, orders to the site, a kitchen rail.CampGuide: The ticket reaches the kitchen rail carrying the site number. | No | Yes |
| Spa and wellnessProvider certifications, room turnover buffers, waitlist and gap offers.CampGuide: Certifications, room turnover and gap offers, on the guest's folio. | No | Yes |
| GolfTee sheet, green and cart fees, frost delays, league blocks.CampGuide: Green fee and cart fee priced apart, because your state taxes them apart. | No | Yes |
| Events and venuesBookable spaces, itemized quotes, contracts, deposits, group blocks with a cutoff.CampGuide: A quote saved with the numbers it was built from, so March still makes sense in June. | No | Yes |
| Workamper hiringPostings on two boards, applications without an account, fair hiring checks, access that ends.CampGuide: Identity checked before the keys, and access dated so it lapses in October. | No | Yes |
| Workflows you write yourselfAutomation of the tasks they built.CampGuide: Your rule, a manager approval, and a run history that says who decided. | Partly | Yes |
| The park map, drawn by youThey design the booking layout for you.CampGuide: Drag a site the morning you actually move it, without a ticket. | Partly | Yes |
| Portfolio console for several parksCentral reservations, consolidated books, owner and investor statements.CampGuide: Central reservations, consolidated books and owner statements above your parks. | Yes | Yes |
| Distribution beyond your own pageThe Campspot Marketplace is a real channel. Ask what a booking through it costs you.CampGuide: CampChannel pushes your nights to the channels, and your own page keeps the booking commission free. | Yes | Yes |
No means we could not find it published, not that it is impossible to do. Ask both of us to show it working on your own sites rather than describe it on a slide.
What decided it for the parks already on CampGuide.
When we ask an operator why they moved, we hear the same three answers, and price is never the first one.
Automate anything in the park, in your own words.
A workflow starts from any module. An agreement still unsigned after 48 hours. A tenancy that goes fourteen days past due. Forty departures at eleven. A work order that just blocked a site the desk is about to sell. You write the rule in plain words, put a manager approval in the middle when you want one, and the run history says which rule was true and who decided.
This is the answer operators give when we ask why they moved. Not a request filed against someone else's roadmap. The automation your park needs, built by your park, the afternoon you need it.
See workflowsRun history
Nothing has run yet. A test run walks every step for real and sends nothing.
Press test run and watch it walk the steps.
Every setting in your park is a control you hold.
Rates, fees, discounts, site types, cancellation rules, turnover behavior, your booking page and your map are yours. Change a shoulder season rate at four on a Tuesday and it is live at the counter before you stand up. Move a site on the map the morning you actually move it.
We configure the whole park for you before you go live, and then we hand you the keys to all of it. That is the second answer operators give, and the two together are why parks leave software they have used for years.
See rates and settingsRules on this site type
Why Sat 13 is $84
Event pricing is dated. It applies to the fair weekend and lifts on its own afterwards.
Turn on demand pricing and watch the busy nights move.
A guest can finance the stay. You are paid in full, that day.
A family books the cabin for a week and splits it into four payments at checkout through Klarna or Affirm. The money reaches your park the same day it would on any other booking. The folio, the deposit rules and the refund path behave exactly the way they always do.
It takes price off the table on the stays worth the most to you, and your park carries none of it. CampGuide handles the financing side end to end, and nobody at your desk ever chases a balance.
See the guest experienceAdd a night, or another camper, and watch every line re price.
The parts that usually become a second subscription.
Three of them, on real screens you can click. Every charge in each one lands on the folio the guest already has open, which is the difference between another line on your bill and another line on your revenue.
The massage lands on the same folio as the site.
A guest in cabin 3 books a 90 minute deep tissue at two. The schedule only offers a therapist certified for it, holds the room a little longer than the therapist for turnover, and posts the treatment to the reservation they already have open.
Without it, the spa is a paper book and a second card swipe, and the money reconciles at month end if somebody remembers.
See spa and wellnessDrag an appointment to another provider or time. Try an illegal drop too.
The winter storage lot is a tenancy, not a booking.
Twelve tenants bill on the first without anyone building an invoice, a rate increase is scheduled in February for April, and a unit that goes fourteen days past due walks the late fee, dunning and overlock path on its own.
A departing seasonal guest gets an offer for the lot before the rig leaves, which is revenue you were losing at the gate.
See storageTap a vacant spot to move a tenant in.
The grill takes orders from site 22.
One cheeseburger, priced once, on the lunch menu and the late night menu. A family orders from the stay pass, the ticket reaches the kitchen rail with the site number on it, and the charge posts to their folio.
The summer menu waits until Memorial Day because you published it as a version, not because someone remembered to swap it.
See food and beverageGuests read this. It stays exactly as published until you publish again.
Take one from ordered to handed over, or send it back to the grill.
Take one from ordered to handed over, or send it back to the grill.
A switch you can undo.
Nobody moves a park on a promise. Here is the path, with the undo button in the middle of it and a go live date you pick.
Every operator should be able to get reservations, guests, sites, rates and payment history out of Campspot. Ask for it in writing before you commit to anyone, including us.
Site types, rate plans, fees and guest records are matched to how your park is actually set up, not to how the file happened to be shaped.
The import shows you every row it is about to create, what it matched, and what it could not. Nothing is saved while you read it.
If it is wrong, one button takes the batch back out. That is the difference between a migration you can try and a migration you have to survive.
Hand us your rate sheet, your fees and your cancellation policy and we configure the whole thing, then price a stay from last season in front of you to check the number matches.
You keep taking bookings in Campspot until the day you cut over, and we set that date around your season rather than ours. After it, the grid is live for everyone at the counter at once.
The preview is the whole point.
Your Campspot export is matched to your site types, rate plans and guest records, then shown to you row by row before a single thing is written. What matched, what did not, and what it is about to create.
If it is wrong, one button takes the whole batch back out for thirty days. Nobody should move a park on a promise.
See how switching worksFix the five rows the preview flagged.
43 things your park can use from the start.
Everything on this list is live today and running in parks right now. Not a roadmap, not a beta, and not a release you wait for.
43things on that list, all of them built for parks and running today. Ask about any one of them and we will show it working on your own sites and rates, and tell you what is included for your park.
What Campspot publishes.
Their claims, shortened and not spun. If we left out something that matters to you, bring it to the call and we will answer it straight.
Reservations, pricing and the grid
An all in one platform for more than 3,500 parks across the US and Canada, with dynamic pricing, grid optimization for the reservation Tetris, lock site, and add ons at checkout.
The rest of the operation
Front desk, housekeeping, a camp store point of sale across several locations, and accounting ready reporting on a cash or accrual basis.
Marketing and distribution
Email marketing, two way guest texting, and the Campspot Marketplace, which they describe as the largest campground specific OTA.
Scale and integrations
An integrations portal, an online booking API, and one platform serving private parks, public parks and multi park groups.
What Campspot leads with, and how we answer it.
Their strongest pitches, and the answer we give when an operator brings one of them to the call.
Their Marketplace is a real channel
It sends bookings to parks, and it is the reason a lot of operators shortlist them. Put your OTA mix on the table at the first call and we will walk through how your own booking page, your channel connections and your waitlist fill those same nights without paying for them twice.
A large install base
Thousands of parks means a large user community and plenty of operators who have hit your problem before. Ask them what a support response looks like on a Saturday in July, then ask us the same question, and compare the two answers.
A published integrations portal
Dozens of named connections, clearly listed, which is genuinely useful when you are shopping. Bring the tools you already pay for to the call and we will tell you exactly how each one connects here.
Grid optimization
Grid optimization is the feature they are best known for. CampGuide answers it with best fit placement and orphan night recovery working the same grid, and you can watch it fill your own calendar on the call.
The questions a feature list never answers.
These are the ones that decide how your second season goes, long after the demo is over.
What leaves with you if it ends.
Reservations, guests, folios, payments, rates and your map, exported on demand in a format your accountant can open, and that does not change on the day you cancel. Ask every vendor on your list to put that in writing.
Who picks up on a Saturday in July.
The founder and the person who wrote the screen, on the same day. No ticket number and no waiting until Monday to find out whether it is a known issue.
Who changes a rate at four in the afternoon.
You do. Rates, fees, discounts, site types, cancellation rules, turnover behavior and the map are yours to change on a Tuesday, and we will name the handful of settings that still come through us.
Where the money actually lands.
Deposits and payments run through CampGuide Pay on your own account, refunds are reversals on the folio rather than cash out of the drawer, and once a day is closed nobody backdates a payment into it.
What your seasonal staff can see.
Access is by role, financial reports are their own permission, and a workamper's access is dated so it lapses in October instead of living on until somebody remembers it in December.
What your park sells that software usually ignores.
The spa, the grill, the tee sheet, the storage lot, the pavilion and the people you hire for the season. If any of those is a spreadsheet today, that is the line on your P and L this decision moves.
Then ask both of us the same questions.
Ours are answered here, in writing. Take the same list to your Campspot call and write their answers next to them.
Can I export everything, including after I leave?
Ours: Yes, on demand, and that does not change on the day you cancel.
Who answers when it breaks in July?
Ours: The founder, and the person who wrote the screen.
How many settings can I change without a support ticket?
Ours: Rates, fees, discounts, site types, cancellation rules, turnover behavior and the map are all yours, today, without a ticket.
What happens to the data model when a module is added?
Ours: Nothing bolts on beside it. A tee time, a massage and a bag of ice land on the same folio as the site.
Who draws my map, and who can move a site later?
Ours: You do, both times. Drag it yourself and move a site the morning you move it.
Can I break the product before I sign?
Ours: Yes, on your own sites and rates, on the call.
Built for parks like yours.
Five signs this is the right platform for your park, and four things worth telling us on the first call.
CampGuide is built for you if
- A good part of your revenue happens after the guest arrives
- You already run a spa, a grill, a tee sheet, a venue or a storage lot
- You want to change a rate or move a site without opening a ticket
- Seasonal and long stay guests are a real part of your year
- Your best stays are the expensive ones, and you want financing to carry the price
- You would rather talk to the person who built it than a queue
Tell us these early and we will show you the answer
- The share of your nights that come through OTAs today
- The gate, meters, locks and accounting already installed on your property
- Whether your group also runs property that is not a park
- Who at your park will be the day to day owner once it is live
None of these are dealbreakers. They are the four things worth putting on the table in the first ten minutes, so the rest of the call is spent showing you your own park running rather than guessing at it.
Questions we get asked on every call.
Is CampGuide a replacement for Campspot, or does it sit alongside it?
A replacement. Both of us take the booking, run the desk and hold the money, so running two would mean two grids and two sets of books. Everything your park sells lands on the same folio here, which is the part that stops working if you split it.
Can I switch in the middle of a season?
You can, and parks do. The import previews before it writes and the whole batch can be pulled back out for thirty days. If your timing looks wrong for your park we will say so rather than take the deal.
What happens to my Campspot reservations, guests and payment history?
They come across. Ask Campspot for your export in writing first, then we match it to your site types, rate plans and guest records and show you every row before anything is saved.
Can I automate something you did not build for me?
Yes. Workflows start from any module, run the rule you wrote in plain words, take a manager approval in the middle if you want one, and keep a run history that says which rule was true and who decided. You do not file a request and wait for a release.
Can a guest finance a stay without me carrying the risk?
Yes. A guest can split the stay into payments at checkout through Klarna or Affirm, and your park is paid in full the same day, the same as any other booking. CampGuide handles the financing side, the folio, the deposit rules and the refund path all behave the way they always do, and you never chase anyone for a balance.
Do I have to use all of it?
No. Every park runs the front desk, rates, housekeeping, the store and the guest side, and the rest switches on when your park needs it. We will tell you plainly what is included for your park and what is not, before you sign anything.
What about my gate, my meters, my locks and my accounting?
Bring the list of what is already installed on your property to the first call. We will tell you what we talk to today and what we would have to build, before you make a decision, not after.
Everything above about Campspot comes from their public site, reviewed August 2026, and may have changed since. We would rather you check it than take our word for it.
Comparing us to someone else.
Same board, same marks, a different company on the other side of it.
Ask us the hard questions.
Bring your rate sheet, your busiest weekend and the thing you are sure no software handles. We will build it in front of you, on your own sites and your own rates, before you decide anything.