If you're the kind of flyer who rocks up to the airport with minutes to spare, Ryanair just made your life a bit harder. From Tuesday 10 November, the airline's bag drop desks at every airport it serves will shut 60 minutes before scheduled departure, up from the previous 40-minute cut-off.
The change only affects the roughly one in five Ryanair passengers who check a bag into the hold. Anyone travelling with just a cabin bag can carry on as before: check in online, head straight through security and walk to the gate. But if you've paid for a 20kg case, you'll now need to be at the desk a full hour before your flight is due to leave — miss it and the bag (and likely you) aren't going anywhere.
Ryanair frames the move as a fix for a nagging problem: a small but consistent number of passengers who drop their bags in time, then get stuck in long security or passport control queues and end up missing boarding. The extra 20 minutes is meant as a buffer, which matters most in peak season when airport lines can stretch well past an hour. Dara Brady, the airline's chief marketing officer, pointed to busy travel periods as exactly when the change should help.
The timing is worth noting beyond the rule itself. Ryanair boss Michael O'Leary has separately warned that European airfares could jump by as much as 20 per cent in 2027, citing higher jet fuel costs — driven in part by disruption around the Strait of Hormuz — and a shrinking number of seats as weaker airlines go bust or get absorbed by rivals. In other words, the era of ultra-cheap flights may be cooling, which makes squeezing value out of each booking more worthwhile.
So what does this mean in practice? First, check your itinerary for the departure date — the rule applies from 10 November, not before. Second, if you check a bag, build the hour into your airport plan rather than relying on the old 40-minute buffer, especially at big, slow-moving hubs like Stansted, Dublin or Barcelona. Third, consider whether you actually need the checked bag at all: travelling light means the new rule doesn't touch you, and online check-in remains mandatory either way. Ryanair's baggage fees vary by route and season, so paying for a bag at booking is almost always cheaper than at the airport.
The 60-minute rule won't ruin anyone's holiday, but it's the kind of small print that punishes the unprepared. Arrive with time to spare, keep your boarding pass downloaded before you leave for the airport, and you won't notice the difference — except, hopefully, in shorter queues at the gate.
