The post contains some affiliate links. Review my disclosure for more information.
If you’re wondering what to buy the hippie in your life, this is a list of 13 gifts for your favorite digital nomad. Before we get started, the 2018 digital nomad gift guide is a list of things that I’ve just found and/or experienced. In other words, this is a new-to-me digital nomad gift guide. If it’s not new to you, as with everything, take what you can use and leave the rest.
Gifts For Nomads
Digital nomads are unique in our needs and while different in EVERY. OTHER. WAY., finding gifts for traveling workers and your wanderlust friend, is surprisingly similar.
1. LifeStraw Personal Water Filter
Ok, so if you, a friend, or family member travel abroad (and increasingly, even if you don’t), you may worry about the safety of your water.
And since you can’t carry your Britta or Pure filters on flights or in your carry-on luggage, this little LifeStraw may save one of your favorite people from the dreaded tummy bubbles that inevitably hit when you travel. This is, without a doubt, the gift I’m most excited to try. For the cost of a few plastic bottles of water, you could have a reusable straw that filters your water, removing microplastics and reducing turbidity down to 0.2 microns.
As if that’s not awesome enough, you can use it for up to 1000 gallons of water and for every straw purchased, a school child in need receives safe drinking water for one year.
2. Super Soft Neck Support Travel Pillow
Digital Nomads travel a lot. Between little seats on flights and riding shot-gun in the RV, it can be hard to get a restful (and comfortable) sleep when you travel.
This neck pillow may be the solution to every digital nomad’s travel sleep issues. Sleep while sitting up. Sleep on a cramped economy international flight.
Help your favorite digital nomad get real rest while traveling without having to splurge on a business class flight.
3. Venture Pal Lightweight Packable Durable Travel Hiking Backpack Daypack
This bag is one of my favorite things. I mentioned it in my last travel gift guide. It folds down into a little pouch and when I travel, I throw the whole thing into my checked back to use as my travel bag when I get where I’m going.
We ended up buying two bags, one for my husband and one for myself. When the kids spill juice or water on the bag, it stays dry and I it has nice interior pockets to help me keep all.the.things organized.
Maybe I’m a bit of a packing nerd, but I love being able to pack a bag inside of a bag. Because without a doubt, when I arrive at my destination, I always wish I had an extra bag. This Venture Pal bag takes care of that for me.
4. BUBM Travel Cable Organizer
People who move often travel with a ton of electronics.
Afterall, you can’t stick your phones, tablets, headphones and all of the extra cords in your checked baggage. Luggage gets lost and you can’t function without a charge phone, these days.
And when you travel with a family, you not only have your electronics but you have the kids’ electronics and chargers as well as all of the same stuff for your spouse. So basically, you need one big bag to carry the chargers and the electronics.
This BUBM travel cable is a lifesaver. it’s basically a sleeve to organize the chicken wire shame of chargers that frequent travelers haul around.
5. Compression Socks
Gifts for vandwellers and gifts for international travelers don’t need to be very different.
While vastly different in travel preferences, these two groups have similar problems.
They sit a lot sometimes.
And while this digital nomad has a love/hate relationship with compression socks, they’re definitely helpful. On long-haul flights, compression socks keep your legs active.
And while no one really wants to get socks as a present, these compression socks make for excellent stocking stuffers (ha! pun intended) and can be given in combination with any gift on this year’s list.
Any digital nomad will get good use out of these babies.
6. Pocket blanket
Being a digital nomad or someone who moves around a lot is an exercise in preparedness. For many of us, it’s like extreme camping.
Do we have everything we need?
In my case, I never have everything I need but I never have enough room in my checked and carry-on luggage. This is why I love travel blankets.
This is more like a travel sheet. It’s not warm or made for snuggling. This is a waterproof and sand proof mat that you can use at the park or the beach.
It’s a great place for a picnic and for us, it’s also a great place to have our kids sit while we travel. On 14-hour flights, if we score the bulkhead seats, we can stretch this blanket out and let the kids play on the airplane floor for a bit. This little blanket gives our kids a nice place to sit and play and makes snack clean up a breeze.
So whether you camp, like to take impromptu picnics, or just need a clean place to allow your kids (or yourself) to stretch out and relax during long trips, this blanket is it.
7. Travel Towel
Travel towels are the best invention ever. They have unlimited uses, and I love how lightweight
they are and how you can use them to clean anything while you travel.
You can use them at the beach or the pull. You can take them to the gym to yourself from melting in a pool of sweat. They’re always great when you’re always on the road; I’m sure these towels would be an RV staple.
When we travel, there’s always something that needs cleaning. Taking long-haul flight with kids, it’s a miracle if everyone (mom and dad included) stays clean and dry for the entire flight.
These towels make excellent lap napkins for snack time and could and make for easy clean up when you’re on-the-go.
8. Zero Grid Travel Security Belt
I don’t know about you, but I liked to wear jeans when I travel. Yoga pants and leggings don’t always have pockets. Plus, slacks just look so nice.
My problem with jeans is that I need a belt and when we already have umpteen gazillion things to get through security, having to worry about my belt is not a priority.
Then I found this belt. The buckle is metal-free so I don’t have to take it off when I walk through security and I can keep a little extra cash in this belt’s little hidden interior pocket.
It’s the perfect gift for any digital nomad, especially for the nomad always leaving on a jet plane. It’s a safe, discrete, and fairly inexpensive way to speed up your security line experience while keeping your cash in a safe place.
9. Family Passport Carrier
If you’ve ever tried to keep track of more than one passport,
you know it can be a bit of nightmare. There’s no good place to keep a family or four’s passports safely AND that allows you to have easy access to them.
My husband either puts them in his pocket or they get (temporarily) lost in my “mom bag.”
This little family passport carrier is genius. It has the RFID protection everyone is always raving about and it comfortably hold up to 6 passports. And it zips up, keeping all the passports safe, while allowing you to stick it in a bag or in a jacket pocket for easy access for later use.
10. Collapsible water bottle
I always keep a reusable water bottle on me when I travel. The issue is most water bottles are so big and bulky.
Unless your backpack has water bottle holders, your reusable water bottle could cause you to have less space in your carry on.
This collapsible water bottle is perfect for travel. Sure, it’s plastic (negative) but it collapses to a small enough size where you can throw it your bag without it having a huge impact on your space allocations.
I don’t know about you, but that keeps me from leaving it behind. I’m notorious for leaving good stainless steel reusable water bottles behind at security because I have so many things to track (kids, kid stuff, strollers, husband, husband’s stuff, my stuff — typically in that order) that I forget little things like my favorite water bottle at security gates in random parts of the world.
11. Storage Bags
This may seem like something digital nomads wouldn’t find useful, but digital nomads go to the grocery store. We may travel light but we buy stuff, especially to eat.
Many digital nomads also do a fair amount of walking since we don’t always have access to personal vehicles when we travel abroad.
This wheelie storage bag is perfect for your favorite digital nomad. It collapses and folds fairly easily so it won’t take up much space in a regular suitcase. And when you arrive at your destination, you have an automatic grocery bag for walking around a new city and picking up the essentials you need without having to buy plastic bags.
Digital Nomad Gift Guide For Ladies Only
The following gifts are for ladies only. They are not gag-gifts and I suggest that you think twice before you buy your favorite digital nomad these gifts. They’re personal products and only very close friends and family should ever ever ever buy something like this for someone else. And even then, a purchase like this could go south (no pun intended) very quickly.
My suggestion is that digital nomad women buy these gifts for themselves.
12. Go Girl
I’ve always wanted to be able to pee standing up.
For some of ya’ll that’s weird and I’m sorry but for the rest of you, you feel my pain. It would be so convenient and less invasive than the traditional way.
It’s also waaay cleaner to stand up than it is to come into physical contact with some of the restrooms you encounter as a digital nomad. I should write an entire article on digital nomad restroom experiences. But until then, the Go Girl is a perfect solution to needing to “go” but not wanting to moon the world to get the job done.
One brave brave woman tested the Go Girl on Youtube. So, you can see how it works. Check out the Youtube video and see how the Go Girl really works.
13. Diva Cup
Digital nomad women know that finding a store and learning how to say tampon or sanitary napkin in a foreign language when you’re already not feeling 100% is rough. Instead of packing an arsenal of feminine products, the Diva Cup is the compact solution to that awkward situation.
The Diva Cup is small and it’s made of medical grade silicone. So it’s super flexible too. Just throw it in your carry-on bag and you’ll never be caught by surprise again, having to negotiate feminine product purchases as a foreigner in a foreign language. Believe me. It’s the worst.