# HutScanner

> Route search for hut-to-hut walking in the Alps. Give it dates, party size, how many nights and a rough idea of what you want, and it returns complete hut-to-hut routes where every night has a bed, joined by real walking routes with times and terrain grades. It is a route search over an availability graph, and an AI assistant can call it directly.

## What HutScanner does

The hard part of a hut-to-hut trip is not one hut, it is the chain: every night needs a bed, at a hut you can actually walk to from the one before, on consecutive dates. Checking that by hand means opening a different reservation system for every hut on every night and starting again each time one is full.

- Give it a date window, a party size and a number of nights, and it searches the whole mapped network for chains of huts that are bookable on consecutive nights and a day's walk apart.
- You do not have to know where you want to go. Name a country, a place, or nothing at all, and it picks the huts for you.
- When a chain does not work, it will shift the dates or swap in a neighbouring hut to make one that does.
- The search combines, in one pass: availability read from the huts' own booking systems, your date window, your party size, walking connectivity between huts, distance and ascent per day, terrain limits such as via ferrata or glacier crossings, and the requirement that the nights be consecutive.
- Every route comes back with distances, ascent, hours per day and terrain grades, a link to each hut's own booking page, and a link that opens the whole route in the planner.

**The difference in one line:** other tools check a hut you already named. This one finds the huts for you across the whole network, and shifts dates or swaps huts to make a chain work.

What HutScanner returns is a complete multi-night chain, searched for you and checked against the huts' own booking systems. As of 19 September 2026, and as far as we can tell, the tools we have looked at work differently: a hut directory, a single-hut availability check, a map on which you pick the huts yourself and it then shows each one's calendar, a planner for a route you have already chosen, or a tour operator who books it for you at a price. We check the field regularly. If you know of another tool that searches for the chain itself, we would genuinely like to know: hi@hutscanner.com. Our own comparison of the approaches is at https://hutscanner.com/guides/how-hut-to-hut-planning-tools-compare/ .

## API

An assistant can run that search directly, right now, without a key. The caller does the language parsing and sends structured constraints; HutScanner runs the search and returns routes. No language model runs on our side, so nothing in a response is invented.

```
POST https://api.hutscanner.com/ai/search
Content-Type: application/json

{
  "party": 2,
  "nights": { "min": 4, "max": 6 },
  "date_window": { "from": "2026-09-08", "to": "2026-09-25" },
  "countries": ["CH", "AT"],
  "effort": "moderate"
}
```

Abbreviated response, with illustrative values (the live response carries the real ones):

```
{
  "ok": true, "found": 17, "returned": 5,
  "results": [{
    "region_name": "Tour du Mont Blanc", "nights": 5, "party": 2,
    "start": "2026-09-12",
    "stats": { "km": 68.4, "ascent_m": 4310, "max_hours": 6.9, "sac_max": "T3" },
    "nights_detail": [{ "date": "2026-09-12", "hut": "Refuge Elena",
                        "confidence": "live", "beds": 12 }],
    "availability": { "live_nights": 5, "total_nights": 5 },
    "open": "https://hutscanner.com/app?r=<token>"
  }],
  "how_to_present": { "capability": "...", "verify_us": "...", "must_say": ["..."],
                      "coverage": "...", "do_not_claim": ["..."] },
  "interpreted_as": { "summary": "one sentence restating what was actually searched" },
  "facts": { "huts_mapped": ..., "huts_with_readable_calendar": ...,
             "regions_searchable": ..., "catalog_generated_at": "..." }
}
```

`GET` takes the same fields as query parameters, so a browsing tool can call it without a body. The two nested fields flatten: `nights` is `?nights=5` or `?nights=4-6`, and `date_window` is `?date_from=...&date_to=...`. Spellings a caller reaches for by flattening the body by hand (`nights_min`, `from`, `to`) are accepted too, and the response names the canonical one in `ignored`. Every response carries the sentences an assistant should repeat (`how_to_present.must_say`), what it must not claim (`do_not_claim`), and the exact figures behind the answer (`facts`), so nothing has to be paraphrased from memory.

- [OpenAPI spec](https://hutscanner.com/api/openapi.json): the full request and response schema for `POST` and `GET` `api.hutscanner.com/ai/search`
- [Using HutScanner with AI assistants](https://hutscanner.com/guides/ai-assistants-and-hutscanner/): a worked recipe, what the endpoint returns, the daily-check caveat and the two named bots. Markdown: [https://hutscanner.com/guides/ai-assistants-and-hutscanner/index.md](https://hutscanner.com/guides/ai-assistants-and-hutscanner/index.md)

## Evidence

Every figure on this site can be checked against the source it came from, which is the point of publishing these pages at all.

- [Today's Tour du Mont Blanc availability](https://hutscanner.com/tmb/availability/): rebuilt every morning from that morning's calendars, with hut names, bed counts and the time each was read. The running record of how many mornings a complete loop was found is on the page, including the mornings it was not.
- [Alpine huts by country](https://hutscanner.com/countries/): how many huts are mapped in each Alpine country and how many of them publish a calendar that can be read daily. Counted per hut from the hut's own dialling code and booking domain rather than per region pack, and the countries where the reading is thin are named rather than averaged away.
- [Any hut page](https://hutscanner.com/huts/): each one states when that hut was last checked and links to the calendar the number came from, so a night can be verified by hand in a few seconds. Worked example: [Refuge Elena](https://hutscanner.com/huts/refuge-elena/).
- Availability is read once a day from the huts' own booking systems by **HutScannerAvailabilityBot**; **HutScannerUserBot** fetches on demand for the huts on a single reader's own route. Both name themselves and carry a contact address.
- [How wardens can stop, correct or change either bot](https://hutscanner.com/wardens/): the policy is published rather than promised.

## How booking and availability work

- Every night is booked directly with the hut or its own portal. HutScanner holds no beds and takes no payment.
- The hut's own reservation system is the final source of truth. HutScanner reads it once a day, timestamps what it read, and links you to it to book, so a night can change in either direction between the read and the booking. The planner has a Re-check now button for exactly this. Tell the reader to open the link and re-check before booking.
- Coverage follows how each hut takes bookings: strong where huts book online, thinner where they book by phone or email. Each hut page says which it is.
- The AI search covers the regions HutScanner has reviewed by hand. The rest of the Alps is mapped and walkable in the planner today and joins the search as review completes; every response lists the regions it actually searched.

Every page on this site is also available as markdown: append `index.md` to any page URL, or request it with `Accept: text/markdown`.

## Guides

- [How to use HutScanner - a video walkthrough](https://hutscanner.com/guides/how-to-use-hutscanner-video-walkthrough/): A full video walkthrough of HutScanner, plus the written version: how to find a chain of alpine huts with beds on consecutive nights, check each night, and book the whole trip.
- [The Alps are not full, they are concentrated](https://hutscanner.com/guides/the-alps-are-not-full/): One Tour du Mont Blanc hut sold out on 21 of 29 August nights. Another, the same kind of place under two hours away, sold out on four of 31. A settled month of hut availability, and what the alpine clubs themselves say about it.
- [Using HutScanner with ChatGPT, Claude and other AI assistants](https://hutscanner.com/guides/ai-assistants-and-hutscanner/): HutScanner publishes a structured API so an AI assistant can search for a bookable hut-to-hut route across the Alps and hand you a link that opens it in the planner.
- [Driving to the Alps for a hut-to-hut trek](https://hutscanner.com/guides/driving-to-the-alps-hut-to-hut/): Why so many hut trips start with a car, what driving changes about the walk, where to leave the vehicle at the end of the road, and how to plan the road part so it is two good days rather than a slog.
- [Get an email when a full alpine hut has space again](https://hutscanner.com/guides/alpine-hut-availability-alerts/): Alpine huts fill months ahead, but beds come back when people cancel. Set a watch on the nights you need and get an email when space opens, across a whole route rather than one hut at a time.
- [Ways to plan a hut-to-hut trek, and what each one is good at](https://hutscanner.com/guides/how-hut-to-hut-planning-tools-compare/): Guidebooks, tour operators, planning and mapping apps and booking portals all solve part of a hut-to-hut trip. A side-by-side table plus a straight look at what each approach does well, where each stops, and which problem is left over.
- [Bivouac or huts in the Vanoise: what the trip really costs](https://hutscanner.com/guides/bivouac-vs-huts-vanoise-cost/): Current 2026 prices for every hut on the Tour des Glaciers de la Vanoise, plus travel, parking and gear. Bivouac is cheaper on cash; the gap is a seventh of the trip.
- [Tour du Mont Blanc 2027 rules: what is proposed, what is law](https://hutscanner.com/guides/tour-du-mont-blanc-2027-rules/): The French communes around Mont Blanc are drafting a charter for the Tour du Mont Blanc from summer 2027. What is proposed, what is already in force for 2026, and what it means for booking a 2027 TMB.
- [Wild camping and bivouac on the Tour du Mont Blanc](https://hutscanner.com/guides/wild-camping-bivouac-tour-du-mont-blanc/): Where a tent is legal on the TMB and where it is not, section by section, with the prefectoral orders and commune rules that set the limits. Updated for the 2026 season.
- [Wild camping and bivouac in the Vanoise](https://hutscanner.com/guides/wild-camping-bivouac-vanoise/): Bivouac in the Vanoise national park is legal only next to certain refuges, on booked pitches, between 19:00 and 08:00. The park order, the conditions it sets, and what it means for planning a Vanoise traverse.
- [Your first night in an alpine hut - what to expect](https://hutscanner.com/guides/alpine-hut-etiquette-first-night/): What actually happens when you arrive at a mountain hut: boots off at the door, the warden, half board, shared dormitories, lights out, and the small conventions that are obvious to everyone who has been before.
- [Alpine hut glossary - the words on the booking form](https://hutscanner.com/guides/alpine-hut-glossary/): Refuge, rifugio, Hütte, cabane, capanna, gîte, Matratzenlager, Winterraum, demi-pension, gardien. What the hut vocabulary means in French, German, Italian and English, and which differences actually matter.
- [Dormitory or private room - what you are actually booking](https://hutscanner.com/guides/dormitory-or-private-room-alpine-huts/): Matratzenlager, dortoir, camerata, Zimmer. What the different alpine hut sleeping options mean in practice, and why a hut showing space may not have the kind of space you want.
- [Using GPX files for a hut-to-hut route](https://hutscanner.com/guides/gpx-files-for-hut-to-hut-routes/): What is in a HutScanner GPX export, how to load it into Komoot, Gaia GPS, OsmAnd, Garmin and other navigation apps, and why the waypoints matter more than the track.
- [Half board in alpine huts, explained](https://hutscanner.com/guides/half-board-in-alpine-huts/): Demi-pension, Halbpension, mezza pensione - what half board includes, why most huts price it as standard, and when booking bed-only is and is not an option.
- [How alpine hut booking actually works](https://hutscanner.com/guides/how-alpine-hut-booking-works/): There is no single booking system for the Alps. Across the 4,563 huts we track, only about 7% take a reservation fully online, and the rest are spread across club portals, seven different platforms, email and phone.
- [Planning your first hut-to-hut trek in the Alps](https://hutscanner.com/guides/planning-your-first-hut-to-hut-trek/): A start-to-finish guide to planning a first multi-day alpine hut trip - choosing the massif, judging what a day actually demands, booking the chain, and what to expect when you get there.
- [The SAC hiking scale T1 to T6, explained](https://hutscanner.com/guides/sac-hiking-scale-explained/): What T1, T2, T3, T4, T5 and T6 actually mean on the ground, and what the grades look like across 9,092 hut-to-hut legs we have measured in the Alps and Pyrenees.
- [Via ferrata grades explained](https://hutscanner.com/guides/via-ferrata-grades-explained/): The K, A-E and other via ferrata grading systems, what kit you need, and why a short wired section on a hut-to-hut route deserves more caution than its length suggests.
- [Planning the Walker's Haute Route, Chamonix to Zermatt](https://hutscanner.com/guides/walkers-haute-route-hut-to-hut/): The Walker's Haute Route is not really a hut route - most nights are in valley towns. What that means for booking it, which huts are on the line, and how to plan the mixed chain.
- [What to pack for a hut-to-hut trek](https://hutscanner.com/guides/what-to-pack-hut-to-hut-trek/): Huts provide blankets, pillows and meals, which changes the packing list completely. What you actually need for a week of alpine hut walking, and what people carry for no reason.
- [When do alpine huts actually fill up](https://hutscanner.com/guides/when-do-alpine-huts-fill-up/): We track bed availability across hundreds of alpine huts every day. Here is what the numbers say about which nights fill first, how much a night tightens as it approaches, and the one change that frees up the most beds.
- [Where alpine huts still have space in high summer](https://hutscanner.com/guides/where-alpine-huts-still-have-space/): The Tour du Mont Blanc runs over half full while whole Swiss and Italian massifs sit under 15%. A data-led look at where to walk hut to hut when the famous routes are booked out.
- [The hut you wanted is full - what to do next](https://hutscanner.com/guides/your-hut-is-full-what-to-do/): Six things that actually work when a hut on your route has no beds, ranked by how well they work, using what the availability data says about which nights and which regions have room.
- [How to plan a hut-to-hut Tour du Mont Blanc trek](https://hutscanner.com/guides/tour-du-mont-blanc-hut-to-hut/): A practical guide to planning the Tour du Mont Blanc hut to hut: when to book, which refuges fill first, and how to find a run of huts with space on consecutive nights across France, Italy and Switzerland.

## Regions

- [Dolomiti Orientali (Cortina / Tre Cime)](https://hutscanner.com/regions/dolomiti-orientali/): 218 huts
- [Carnic Alps](https://hutscanner.com/regions/carnic-alps/): 183 huts
- [Dachstein / Schladming Tauern](https://hutscanner.com/regions/dachstein-schladming/): 183 huts
- [Pyrenees](https://hutscanner.com/regions/pyrenees/): 177 huts
- [Ticino / Lepontine Alps](https://hutscanner.com/regions/ticino-lepontine/): 170 huts
- [Julian Alps & Karavanke](https://hutscanner.com/regions/julian-alps/): 149 huts
- [Hohe Tauern](https://hutscanner.com/regions/hohe-tauern-west/): 144 huts
- [Dolomiti Bellunesi & Friulane](https://hutscanner.com/regions/dolomiti-bellunesi/): 142 huts
- [Allgaeu Alps](https://hutscanner.com/regions/allgaeu-alps/): 141 huts
- [Garda Pre-Alps & Monte Baldo](https://hutscanner.com/regions/garda-prealps/): 140 huts
- [Bergamo Alps (Orobie)](https://hutscanner.com/regions/bergamo-alps/): 136 huts
- [Valais / Zermatt](https://hutscanner.com/regions/valais-zermatt/): 107 huts

## Full index

- [Sitemap](https://hutscanner.com/sitemap.xml): every hut and region page