London Stansted Airport

Without doubt the worst airport in the world. Huge queues for departure security, hour long queues for passport control. No free drop off or collection without wasting 40 minutes in busses. Car rental now off airport wasting 40 minutes in shuttle busses. Extremely irritating and inaccurate posters saying how well they are doing, Stansted seems to go out of its way to make travel difficult and unpleasant.

✅ Verified Review | What's happened to UK border control? E-passport readers just make the queues longer and mean there aren't enough people. The zig zag roping just means a horrible arrival at a horrible airport. Things here are definitely worse and it looks like they really don't care! The planes don't even land near the terminal these days.

What a dreadful experience! Long queues with rude and impatient staff. The compulsory path through the overpriced shopping centre, the far too few seats available and late information on the flight gate are sneaky and underhand ways to force passengers to part with as much money as possible. Together with keeping so many different people together in a small area (families with children apt to tantrums and tears, youngsters with high noise level thresholds, business travellers) makes for a frustrated and irate passenger as opposed to a happy and satisfied customer.

Unbelievably easy passage through Stansted today, starting at 9.30 am with security control. Minimal wait, and the 'walk of shame' through the shopping centre was really 'muggers' alley' because the shop assistants outnumbered the passing travellers by 10 to 1. More seating space has now become available since the 'revamp' of the shops seems to have been completed, but in high season or at peak periods of the day, this may well be inadequate. The toilets close to the Aspire lounge were poorly maintained. 45 mins notification of the gate before a flight departure is really cutting it too fine, even if the suggested timings from the 'departure lounge' are posted, especially for Ryanair flights at the end of the former domestic pier (gates 87-88) or the Ryanair pier (gates 54 to 50) and can lead to a dense mass of passengers heading hell for leather in one direction. Even 5 more minutes advance notice would help.

Passport control at Stansted, especially for the so called 'fast track' e-gate electronic EU passports was disastrous and queue times were 30 minutes +. This adds to passenger stress and frustration and does not enhance security. The security to departures was similarly awful. The queues weren't as long but the scan equipment 'faulty'. Our bag was diagnosed as containing liquids which caused a 20 minute delay for us while waiting for same to be searched and cleared - no liquids. This actually endangers security when they select the wrong bags and passengers to check. However I will admit staff were moderately polite, apologised for the 'error', empathised with the e-gate fiasco and probably realised Stansted had serious problems. But the experience at Stansted was wholly exasperating and added to the stress of travel. We will endeavour to avoid this airport as much as possible in the future.

✅ Verified Review | Recently arrived at Stansted airport and once again greeted with the usual chaos at passport control. It seems that Stansted is happy to take the huge volume and no doubt profit from it , but not supply adequate resource to deal with this. A taxi came to collect us and unfortunately waited 15 minutes and was fined 50GBP and was not allowed to exit until the amount was paid. The whole place is like a cattle market that doesn't like customers. Building fancy overpriced shops doesn't signify customer care. I have flown in some of the busiest airports in the world and many put Stansted to shame. I encourage everyone to look at alternatives such as Southend.

Is Stansted a shopping centre or an airport? Long queues and overcrowded. Just poor. I am not sure what kind of customer experience they are looking for travellers to enjoy but it completely fails as far as I am concerned. You have to walk from one end of the airport to the other nearly twice through dozens of shops to get the the gates. A ridiculous charge for customer drop off.

I've been to Stansted several times this year and each time there has been massive queues at security and a lack of customer service from staff present there. I dread it every time. Security is one endless snaking queue with incompetent and rude staff who do not care - ordering poor passengers here and there. Once past security, you are faced with another snaking corridor of duty free shops, winding itself around the main terminal. It feels like walking through an Ikea store where you want to find the exit as soon as possible but you can't. This is exacerbated by the fact that due to backlog in security, passengers are dashing for their gate to make their flight in time. I can understand the reason for the snaking shopping corridors, to fit more shops in the limited terminal areas, but after the poor experience of security having to meander through endless shops to get to a gate is a double whammy to a stressed and annoyed passenger. I can still remember the times when Stansted was relatively stress free but since MAG, the service has gone downhill. Compared to other London airports (Heathrow, Gatwick, City and Luton) Stansted represents the worst of the British airport experience. If Luton can do it better with budget airlines and Gatwick (although admittedly with a mixture of budget and national carriers), it begs the question why can't Stansted? A torturous experience.

Arrived at London Stansted 2 hours before flight but spent 1 hour getting through huge queues at security. Plenty of suited wallows with radios but the design of the security is very poor and not enough gates open. I feel sorry for loss of trade at duty free. No time to eat or shop. Dreadful. Use Luton instead.

Absolute disgrace. Security screen area is a mess and free for all for the most part. Also was told assistance lane wasn't open for us with kids and a buggy and then scolded when we went to the normal area and told they can't refuse us at assistance line. The mass crowd into security and before scanners is a nightmare and an accident waiting to happen. Health and safety is definitely not a concern here. Even the staff member manning the barrier couldn't get between them. Then after getting through that mess the shopping mall tour you are forced to run through to get to your gate has you back and forth like a yoyo to give shops footfall. Just look at the map, your start point and when you actually start to head towards your gate are probably only 30mtrs apart but you have to walk the 800 more through the shops. Everything here is designed to slow you down.