YouTuber Fly Man Yann has tested all the upgrades available for Ryanair, Easyjet and Wizzair to help his low cost travel become first class. He gives a breakdown of all of these options and their cost in this mammoth 30-minute video, here is a breakdown of the options he went for:
- Fast track Security – It definitely seems worth it time-wise and for people who hate queuing, however, this will drastically change depending on your flight time and which airport you’re flying from, a few airports have secret entrances to security so it’s worth having a google/search for those first potentially or risking it and upgrading only on the day.
- Lounge access – This seems to vary drastically depending on the airport you’re flying from, it appears to be a no-brainer at Gatwick and Luton but in the Stanstead example the only lounge they had was rammed full… I guess it will be down to how many hours you have to kill and how many glasses of fizz you feel comfortable drinking in that time. Your money should go further with these than buying food upgrades on the plane!
- Priority Boarding – Often expensive to the point it’s often more expensive than the actual ticket! The other problem is that in these 3 examples over 50% of the passengers seemed to buy this addon meaning unless you’re at the front of the queue OR you have a large bag that you need to go up high it’s arguably not worth it at all!
- Seat upgrades – This varies quite a bit but does seem worth it for extra comfort (legroom especially), however, if you’re small or the flight is relatively short is it really worth it? He argues it is; we’re less convinced.
- Empty Seat Purchasing – This appears to be one of the most important options (we didn’t really think it was a thing but it is), however, depending on the flight status it might be money down the drain as often these front rows are empty anyway so you might be better off just risking it.
- Drink and food upgrades – It’s without question the worst part of budget flying, hard to see the value here personally (even if you do spruce it up with some Caviar like he does in the video), far better to eat well in the lounge than pay for this in our opinion.
Sadly there is no obvious definitive list of which are worth the money as it drastically depends on where you’re flying from, your personal wants/needs and your budget, his recap suggestion is to fly from Gatwick, get fast track and pick a lounge then enjoy all the upgrades but that’s putting aside a budget which everyone in the real world needs to consider…
Our opinion will likely vary to yours but we personally would go for: Lounge Access, Seat Upgrade and Empty Seat Purchasing
Which of the 6 examples above would you pick?
See the full video below:
