How early is too early to arrive at the airport?

If you’re parking in a long term car park and getting a park and ride bus then you’ll need all this time. And if you’re bringing children then you’ll need it too !

I am very much a "hurry up and wait" person and I would leave at 12. Mainly because I have driven the M5 many times it is a bastard of a road, always congested and especially on Fridays.

We have a train journey on Saturday and will probably get there ridiculously early for that too!

I think it’s better to be early and having to kill time than to be in a traffic jam and panicking. Even if you get there before baggage drop opens, presumably there is somewhere you can grab a coffee and wait.

Leave early.
It’s better to be early than stressed the whole journey.
We were going to Ibiza last April, there had been protests blocking the roads, even though our flight wasn’t until 6.30pm, & it was two hours to the airport, we left well before noon.
There were no hold ups, but the pleasure of sitting in the airport, relaxing with our audio books, was priceless.

I don't know what Bristol airport is like but we only just made a flight at Stanstead with nearly 3 hours at the airport thanks to rubbish Ryanair queues and a horrific queue for security. So 3 hours is not too much time if you want to relax and not risk the stress. You could always stop somewhere near the airport for coffee/food if you get there ridiculously early.

Arriving two hours before is surely enough for a European flight?

I thought that until I was stuck in a Tui queue for over an hour.

If it’s any consolation I always aim to get to the airport about 5 hours before my flight just in case of delays. Rather be at the airport with loads of time than stress about something happening 😌

Yeah you’re right..fair dos. I’ve taken three flights - not packages - from my local airport this year, all leaving before 6.30 am and it’s been an hours drive in the dark, dump the car at meet and greet and through security in 10 minutes. Probably not a regular experience.

As a regular user of the M5 on a Friday, I would say you're not being unreasonable. There's plenty to do at Bristol airport if you find you get there too early.

I had one like that a week and a half ago. My DH dropped me and I through security in 7 minutes including getting tags for my bags and it was a long haul flight.

I've never regretted getting to the airport too early! Also the last few flights I've been on had self check-in for baggage which seemed to have a much wider window than waiting for a person to open the desk.

EES delays are on arrival (in mainland Europe) not departure.

But regardless, on trains and motorways anything that can go wrong will go wrong.

Easyjet open bag drop 3 hours before sheduled departure according to their website, and close it 1 hour before, so in reality you have 2 hours.
I would allow 2 and a half hours travel time from home - just in case!

Your timing sounds perfect to me.
In my book,you can ever be too early.
Plenty to do at Bristol airport....relaxing to arrive early .

I’d leave at 1 at the absolute earliest

Depends who I'm flying with. Ryanair it's usually 2 hours before, others is 3, some is 4. Also depends how far the airport is. If I'm flying from EMA it's 20 minutes from us so I leave half an hour before check in starts. When we recently flew from Heathrow, we arrived an hour before we could check in (it was fine, we could get a drink and chill). We both hate being late and would rather get there super early than risk getting stuck in traffic. But yeah, the desks don't open until they say they are so be prepared to wait. (Obviously if you've checked in online and only have hand luggage, it doesn't matter)

As long as it's not the night before it's fine- the less rush the less stress.

hello neighbour!

The way I look at it, you either hang around at home or the airport. I think airports are much more fun. There's absolutely nothing wrong with erring on the side of caution. Just pack some snacks as airport food is soooo expensive!

We arrived at Heathrow for a trip to South America via Miami two and a half hours before flight, couldn’t check in online nor at the kiosk but still had plenty of time - though not enough to grab any food or browse shops if that’s your thing.

I remember giving ex DP a lift to the airport for an early afternoon flight. We were both sort of "prowling" the house, bored and antsy and clock watching!

When driving somewhere you can leave early to get the journey done but with planes and trains you cant! In the end he just said "oh fuck it, lets go now! At least if I am there you can go home and I will find a bar or something"

I work for a well known travel company. The advice I’d give is that it’s better to leave earlier rather than later, especially when driving. It’s not super common to miss a plane because of an accident causing traffic, but I’ve seen it more frequently than you’d think this season. If you don’t have holiday insurance you’ll have to self fund a replaces flight. If you do it depends on where you’re travelling and how easy it is to get a replacement flight in peak season. If you miss the first day or whatever of your holiday because of traffic you won’t be compensated, so better to be early. An extra thing I’d advise is pack any meds, a change of clothes and bikini etc in hand luggage. Delayed luggage is much more common than most people think. Don’t leave anything to chance!

For a European flight if you have baggage to check in the desks won’t even open until 1 hours before. We made the mistake of getting there 3 hours before after previously travelling long haul and we got stuck at the cafes waiting for the desks to open so couldn’t even go through to duty free. I think if we had no bags to check or were doing a bag drop we might have got through sooner. I even bought fast track security tickets as we had heard loads of stories about people missing flights due to queue but we got to the security gate and there was no queue so wasted that money. Lol.

This isn’t true, boarding gate will almost have opened one hour before the flight.