Two Ways to Check Gas Prices Before Your Trip

If you are concerned about gas prices this summer, or any time of the year, you can check online for the best deals in a couple of ways. Both have their positives and negatives in their coverage. First, starting for Memorial Day weekend, AAA will allow it's online members to check U.S. prices through their various regional websites. The AAA Fuel Price Finder monitors the gasoline price charged through credit card transactions at the individual stations. Data on price and location will be received from about 85,000 stations throughout the United States. You need to be a member of AAA (fee) and this won't record all transactions.

The free alternative that covers even more areas and Canada is gasbuddy.com. It relies on individual spotter reports across North America but it doesn't require any special computer connections either. So it's not automatically updated by every transaction but it encompasses more places and possibilities. In our checks, it had a pretty thorough report on even some small town gas stations. If a station was much lower than competition two days ago, it will probably have a lower price today.

After record high gas prices hit in early April, the prices have been steadily falling, but are still at higher levels than where the price climb began.