What I Liked (And Didn’t Like) About Flying Ryanair From Barcelona to Tallinn

When you think of low-cost European airlines, Ryanair is probably the first that comes to mind.

With its dirt-cheap base fares, extensive route network, and sassy social media teams, the airline has both fans and detractors. But what’s it actually like to fly with the airline?

I recently took an early-morning trip from Barcelona’s Josep Tarradellas Barcelona–El Prat Airport (BCN) in Spain to Tallinn Airport (TLL) in Estonia. Here are the positives and negatives from my 4-hour Ryanair flight.

Understanding Ryanair Ticket Types and Fees

Ryanair is possibly the most well-known example of low-cost airlines, and it offers 4 fare types: Basic, Regular, Plus, and Flexi Plus.

Put bluntly, the more you pay, the more perks you get. Basic fares come with a random seat assignment and space for only a small personal item, while paying more adds perks like choosing a seat in advance, carry-on or checked luggage, fare flexibility, and even priority boarding or priority security lines.

All of these require checking in online or with the mobile app in advance.

For my flight from Barcelona to Tallinn, the Basic was available for $94.99, while the Flexi Plus (most expensive) fare cost $220.71.

If you don’t want all of the add-ons that come with a certain package, it’s possible to add items individually. And Ryanair offers numerous add-ons — to a somewhat frustrating degree during the checkout process.

You see the following options on a pay-per-addition option:

• Travel insurance
• Carry-on luggage
• Checked luggage
• Onboard shopping credit
• Security fast track
• Seat selection
• Rental cars
• Hotels

Most of these options have more than 1 choice, such as different maximum weights for your checked luggage or more robust travel insurance.

Luckily, the fees are explained clearly. Clicking through multiple pages of offers that you aren’t interested in is time-consuming, but there are no surprises about the cost of add-ons for your trip.

Adding checked luggage or choosing a seat with Ryanair gets more expensive later on. The cheapest time to add these to your trip is when you’re making a reservation. If you think you’ll need these add-ons, book them early to save money.

Hot Tip:

When it’s time to pay, make sure you use a credit card with bonus points on airfare. This will help you earn rewards that you can use for future flights, whether they’re with Ryanair or another airline.

Things I Liked About Flying With Ryanair

Let’s start with the good stuff. Here are the positives from my 4-hour flight.

Friendly Flight Attendants

I found the flight attendants amicable, and they were quick to offer help when they thought passengers needed it, even doing so proactively. This ranged from helping put items in the overhead bins during boarding to lending a third hand to a mother holding an infant and trying to open a diaper bag at the same time.

Crew members were also friendly and informative about safety announcements, items available for sale, and warning passengers before they came down the aisle with a cart.

Good Cleaning

Both the cabin and the lavatories were clean when I boarded the plane, and they stayed that way throughout the flight.

The flight attendants did a good job of periodically checking the bathrooms to ensure they remained clean and stocked.

Abundant Purchase Options

While you may lament the fact Ryanair doesn’t offer any complimentary drinks or snacks on flights, no matter the length, the good news is that there are many options for food, drinks, and more. These are found in the Ryanair mobile app, and you can also find promotional offers here.

There are options for children’s snack boxes, meal deals, and other à la carte items for sale.

You also find sandwiches and hot meals like lasagna or Thai curry.

The app also lists beer, wine, alcohol, and duty-free items like headphones and perfumes.

Hot Tip:

It is possible to book Ryanair flights with points and miles, just maybe not in the way you’re used to. Check out our complete guide to booking low-cost airlines with points.

Things I Didn’t Like About Flying With Ryanair

Now that you’ve seen what I liked, here’s what I didn’t like on my flight.

Disorganized Boarding

Regardless of your opinion about boarding groups or which one you’re assigned to, I think airlines should use a system that gets passengers onto the plane and into their seats efficiently. Unfortunately, that’s not what many airlines do.

Selling the chance to get on the plane earlier lets airlines make money, even if it makes boarding less efficient. Ryanair’s boarding process has just 2 groups: priority and everyone else.

Using this system, numerous passengers arrived at their seats and needed to ask people to get up to let them in.

This shuffling of passengers created traffic jams in the aisle that led to long waits in the jet bridge.

Arbitrary Enforcement of Baggage Rules

While boarding, 3 employees were scanning boarding passes. The line I wound up in had an overzealous employee who sent every passenger to a baggage sizer — after scanning their boarding passes — to check that their personal item or hand baggage fit into the sizer.

I didn’t observe employees from the other 2 lines sending anyone to this baggage sizer — not even if their bag was clearly overstuffed and exceeded the size limits.

When putting my carry-on bag in the sizer, it stuck out of the sizer by a few millimeters. An employee instantly began yelling at me about how I needed to check in my bag and pay the hefty last-minute fee (she didn’t say how much, merely telling me it would be expensive). I told her I wasn’t going to pay and that the issue was merely the flip-flops I’d jammed into the outer pocket before leaving home.

Adjusting items in the bag to make it fit into the sizer was not an option, according to this employee. That doesn’t make sense to me. If I could zip up an outer portion of the bag and it then fit in the sizer on the second try, why did she continue to say it wasn’t sufficient without further explanation? I had to wait for a supervisor to arrive after overhearing her raising her voice and my repeated (and calm) insistence that the bag fit and I wasn’t going to pay. That supervisor told her to let me board.

Inside the plane, however, I saw multiple passengers with luggage much larger than mine. I saw the flight attendants take away 2 suitcases that simply couldn’t fit into the overhead bins, no matter how hard passengers tried to force them in. This left me with the feeling that baggage enforcement was arbitrary, with one line checking every passenger (even those with bags that were obviously under the size requirements) and the others checking no one (even those with bags obviously exceeding the limits).

Lack of Entertainment

Ryanair, like other low-cost carriers, doesn’t offer entertainment screens on its planes. Those cost airlines a lot of money. The airline also doesn’t offer any type of inflight network, neither for Wi-Fi nor for watching movies on your personal device.

That means anything you want to pass the time during your flight needs to be prepared in advance.

I was aware of this before getting on the plane, and it didn’t bother me, but it is a negative when compared to other airlines in Europe.

Lack of Seatback Pockets

I had underestimated the value of seatback pockets on flights. Ryanair doesn’t have them, and I definitely missed this feature during my flight. While I could keep my headphones and laptop in my backpack when I wasn’t using them, I struggled to figure out what to do with my refillable water bottle, which normally spends the entire flight in the seat pocket.

I didn’t want to lay it down or cram it into my backpack, in case it leaked. With no pocket to hold it, I alternated between holding it in my hands and resting it between my hip and the armrest.

Cramped Seats

The low-cost airline model obligates these carriers to fit as many seats into the plane as possible, meaning they can sell more tickets. Thus, the space between rows of seats (known as the pitch) suffers.

I’m 5 feet, 10 inches tall, and my knees weren’t completely pressed into the seat in front of me during the flight. However, there wasn’t much room to spare, and my knees did hit the seat several times while I was adjusting positions throughout the flight.

Additionally, the plane’s seats didn’t have much padding. That meant my back and my butt felt uncomfortable at various points, and I got up to walk down the aisle twice during the 4-hour flight just for the sake of comfort.

And while I’m on the topic of seats, I was surprised the tray table wasn’t adjustable at all. When I put it down, I couldn’t pull it forward to get closer to me; it merely folded down and stayed there. The table was small in comparison to my 14-inch laptop, but it was sturdy.

Final Thoughts

There were positives and negatives from my 4-hour Ryanair flight between Barcelona and Tallinn. I thought the flight attendants were great, but I didn’t much care for the gate staff. And while the seat pitch wasn’t the worst I’ve ever encountered, neither spacing nor comfort earned positive ratings.

Flying with Ryanair is very much a do-it-yourself undertaking. You need to check yourself in, bring your own entertainment, and either bring or buy your own food. Nothing is done for you or given to you without charge.

If you understand that and can work within the system, you can find great deals on flights to get to your destination both safely and cheaply.