A self-proclaimed travel expert has revealed her secret to getting the best seat on a plane — for free.
Elaine Poon, who shares her travel hacks on Instagram, posted a video with 2.2 million views about how she wins out on Ryanair flights without paying any extra fees.
“With budget airlines such as Ryanair and EasyJet, they make their money mostly from charging extra for choosing your seat,” the London-based content creator told Luxury Travel Daily.
The 33-year-old said in the caption that the best seats on a Ryanair flight include the front rows of the plane, emergency aisle seats for extra leg room, and the far-back rows.
She explained that the rear section is preferable because passengers can enter and exit through the back, so it’s just as quick as sitting in the front rows.
But she has one trick that “has always worked” for her to get the seat she desires.
“Check in online as late as possible,” she wrote. “That’s it.”
Ryanair fills up the plane starting with the “worst” seats so that travelers have to pay extra to change them, she claimed in her caption, adding that the airline will “intentionally split people up within the same booking.”
“And as people check in, they fill up the seats, and what’s left are the best ones – either far front or far back,” she said. “Almost always either a window or aisle seat, too.”
She believes that the later you check in to your Ryanair flight, the better the chances are of getting the seats that the airline hasn’t assigned yet, “which are usually the more expensive seats located either in the front, far back or emergency exit rows.”
Poon shared that there have been multiple times where she had the entire emergency row to herself at no extra cost.
When Poon had a 10:15 p.m. flight to Mallorca, she recalled, she checked in somewhere between three and five hours before the flight. For the trip, she chose random seat allocation and managed to snag a front row seat, while her boyfriend got a window seat in the last row.
She said that she refuses to pay an additional fee on airlines like Ryanair or EasyJet “when the whole point of the flying budget is so that we can fly to another country for as cheap as possible.”
Poon shared another time where she had an entire row to herself on an EasyJet flight.
“You guessed it – I didn’t pay extra for it either, because I simply applied the same approach that I’ve been using for every budget airline that makes you pay extra for seats,” she said. “Works. Every. Time.”
However, just like any hack, it’s not always foolproof.
“Obviously, don’t check-in too late, and always check what the cut-off time is because each flight can be different,” Poon added.
“For example, one of my friends was put on a wait list because she checked in later than usual. This doesn’t happen often – definitely hasn’t happened to me,” she said.
“I do have to say that if this does happen and you get bumped from the flight due to overbooking, you get put onto the next flight and receive compensation on top of that. Which, to me, is not that bad.”
Poon’s hack is similar to the “check-in chicken” travel trend that went viral last year.
With that, travelers will intentionally delay their online check-in to the last minute in hopes of landing a better seat. The method relies on the fact that airlines will often charge extra for better seats, split up groups and initially assign fewer desirable seats.
When check-in closes, the leftover seats tend to be the more coveted ones, including those with extra legroom.
Just like in the game of chicken, the point is to push your luck to the limit and eventually get the desired outcome — and your opponent folds. In this case, your opponent is the airline, and your desired outcome is a comfortable seat.
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