A map, which Priceline dubs, the Ultimate Booking Machine, is the centerpiece of the online travel agency's just-released first iPad app.
Priceline claims that Priceline.com and sister company Booking.com "are the only two major online travel agencies to offer pannable real-time hotel mapping and to allow hotel bookings to be made within the iPad app."
iPad users of the Priceline Hotel & Car Negotiator app can select a destination and then pan around the map based on price, star level, guest satisfaction score and Name Your Own Price views.
The latter view shows sections of a city where customers can bid for hotels.
Bookings are completed within the iPad app -- without having to open a browser and navigage to a website.
The Name Your Own Price view also shows prices on winning bids, although they are not date-specific.
"The iPad is all about the map and the iPhone is all about lists," says John Caine, Priceline's senior vice president of marketing.
The differentiation also hinges on how travelers are expected to use the disparate devices.
For example, Caine says users of the iPhone app may be looking to book a hotel for that night and can use the compass and radar function of the iPhone app to point the device north and retrieve a list of five possible hotels.
On the other hand, the iPad is considered a "lean-back" device geared for a more "exploratory" shopping experience, Caine says.
Users of the iPad app can leisurely sit on their couch and run their finger across the map, scrolling from their current location in New York to search for hotels in New Jersey, Caine says.
Despite the iPhone and iPad apps' name, Priceline Hotel & Car Negotiator app, the iPad app doesn't offer rental cars yet. To book a car using Priceline, users would have to navigate to Priceline.com.
All of Priceline's apps, including its Hotel Negotiator app for Android, are free.
Priceline's hybrid iPhone and iPad apps were developed in-house.