HK Express

✅ Verified Review | Flight from Hong Kong was delayed from 5 till 9pm, which mean I arrived in Seoul at 12midnight. This meant no trains, so I had to take a expensive taxi to town. No compensation. The return flight was also bit delayed, airline seems lax on punctuality.

I was supposed to take the 6.55am flight from Hong Kong to Seoul. Arrived at the airport at 5.45am, but was told at the check in to leave behind a telephone number and to come back in 5min. 5mins later the lady at the check in told me that the flight was overbooked and that she would need to reschedule me at the 5pm flight. As such I would miss a full day of my trip. Only explanation given was that the plane changed to a smaller one. Compensation was HKD1645, which far from compensates for the time lost.

Check in at Tokyo Narita was efficient with HK Express. There was a delay in the flight, hence, we arrived in Hong Kong late. The seating was on a 3-3 configuration. Like any other low cost carrier, it looked and felt cramped, but, the pitch was acceptable. The meals were okay. The cabin crew looked tired but they tried their best to look after us. There were turbulences along the way but nothing major. Overall, HK Express is okay, nothing bad, nothing great.

My experience with HK Express was great. I purchased a very cheap ticket and added hot seat plus hot meal. I was entitled to use their priority check in which was a godsend. Check in took a few minutes with no fuss. Onboard service was on par with any regular airlines. The seating is 3x3 with acceptable seat pitch. No entertainment so bring your own. Food was served immediately after take off. My pre ordered hot meal was delivered with a smile plus a free bottle of water. The quantity is small, but the taste was actually quite good. The pilot was from Australia and the high standard and safety is very reassuring. 2:40 hours passed by quickly and we landed in Chiang Mai perfectly on time.

I took the flight from Hong Kong to Chiang Mai which was supposed to depart at 17.05. However no boarding announcement was made at all and by 17.30 the land crew told us that the flight might depart late and asked us to return by 18.15. Passengers left the queue and returned as told and at approximately 7pm they told us to wait until 19.30. Eventually at 20.30 they told us to wait for another announcement which would tell us whether we could fly or not. There was no offer of water or biscuits or any sort of remedial gestures at all. Finally at 9pm we were told that the flight was ready and we were sent to the plane. We had to wait for another 90 minutes onboard before we could take off. Plane left Hong Kong International Airport at 11pm. Unfortunately that was not the end of the story. The flight attendants sold food and drinks on the plane. As we were all very tired and hungry passengers almost all of us had to buy food from them. My friend and I sat in the middle of the plane and when the trolley passed by us and we just humbly wanted to buy 2 cup noodles the flight attendants said they were out of stock! One point to note is that both the land crew and the cabin crew were very helpful.

The HK Express website is easy to use. My flight was from Hong Kong (HKG) to Osaka (KIX). The check-in process with my baggage was pretty straightforward and without problem. The flight was overall quite clean and it departed on time. There is no food/beverage/water everything needs to be bought if you want to eat/drink. But that's okay if it's a short flight. The returning flight was just as simple and easy. There was staff at KIX to help with the check-in and baggage. Flight was also on time overall a smooth and problem free process. The baggage came out pretty quickly on both my flights not too long of a wait. I would definitely recommend this airline for flights around Asia.

I've done the HKG-HND round-trip on HK Express four times in the last 3 months. I always take UO622 dep HKG 7.10 to go to Japan and UO623 dep HND 1.10am coming back. I used to fly CX to HND but prices have really gone up over the past year. Overall I'd give 3 out of 5 stars for my experience. Prices are of course much cheaper than CX and I appreciate that. 2) Flight attendants are professional courteous and the service is good (not that there are many opportunities to get "served" since HKE doesn't offer complementary beverage/food service nor does it offer inflight entertainment). 3) The HKG-HND-HKG flights I've taken have always been on time. 4) Flight times are much more convenient than the CX flights. However 1) Seats are uncomfortable - it's an LCC after all! This doesn't really bother me for the inbound flight which is 3.5 hours but I do end up feeling exhausted after the outbound which is a 4.5 hour redeye. I find the "sweet seats" located in the exit aisles a really bad deal - you get the (slightly) extra leg room but your seat has zero recline. 2) Baggage fees: I've noticed that more recently they've started to enforce their baggage rules much more strictly. Hand baggage may not be more than 7.7kg. If you don't sign up for checked in baggage in advance (online when you buy your ticket) you will be charged an arm and a leg at the airport. This happened to me during my last trip and wouldn't have bothered me (rules are rules after all and these fees are part of the LCC business model) had it not taken 1 hour to receive my bags at Hong Kong airport. 3) Long wait for baggage - This last point is apparently an every day occurrence with HKE at least at Hong Kong airport. They are working with a small staff and small planes so your bags will routinely take an hour or so to arrive at Hong Kong airport baggage claim. This is needless to say frustrating though not the biggest deal in the case of UO623 since you have to kill an hour or so after the flight lands anyway (the first Airport Express to Hong Kong station doesn't leave until 5.54am and UO623 lands at around 4.40am). 4) No mileage programme. All in all I will still use Hong Kong Express but due to some of the negative points I listed above only if the price differential between CX and UO is significant enough to be worth it.

3 flights in the last month (ICN-HKG HKG-CNX HKG-PUS). All arrived either on-time or early. Contract check-in staff at all airports but check in was quick and efficient. Staff were friendly and helpful. You'll likely be on a shuttle bus at some point if you're flying them at HKG. Would love it if they added a check-in lane for those without checked baggage. Expensive food and drink options on board so eat before you go. Pilots were informative and professional. Highly recommended for those on a budget!

We recently flew HKG to Penang direct. The flight was on time leaving and was faultless on the 4 hr flight. The seats are fixed up right with no recline option on any seats. We bought the extra legroom option & were glad we did. Considering the tickets were half the same Dragon air flight and landed only 10 minutes apart this is a no brainer. "I'll be back".

KIX-HKK 1.50am flight was going to be "slightly delayed" due to poor visibility and that the new schedule for the flight will be at 5.30pm! All passengers were given a 1000 yen complimentary food coupons and were asked to leave the boarding gate retrieve their luggage and have their passports stamped "not departed" at the Immigration counters. There were no HK Express staff in the airport to assist passengers the staff were from a different airline company so they did not know what to do with all the queries from passengers. The only way for you to contact the airline company is to call their HQ office in HK. The departure time was again changed to 6pm and then to 7.30pm and then to 10pm. Unbelievable! We did not want to wait any longer than that because we already lost one whole day just waiting in the airport. HK Express had another 2.30pm flight to HK scheduled on that day and we practically begged them to let us be on that flight. At first they said it was not possible but then when all the passengers from the 2.30pm flight had checked-in they allowed us to get on the flight.