Budapest Ferihegy Airport

It is clear that Budapest airport is out of free capacity. The terminals are small and there are too many people to move around freely. The restrooms we visited were not clean at all. They should consider building a new terminal. The connection to the city center by the bus (bumpy roads, non AC) and the old metro isn't the best. On the other hand the staff was nice and our flight had no problems departing on time.

Looks like the airport has a shortage of gates so you are often made to disembark a long way from the main building. The immigration area and queuing system were just abysmal. No clear signage. People jostling past each other. Extremely tight suffocating space. Number of open counters extremely low. Long queue to book a taxi. About 1.5 hrs wasted in the airport itself. Would have thought of avoiding Budapest altogether if I had known of the airport experience.

Departure from Budapest Terminal 2A on a short regional flight. Check in was very quick with almost no one in line. Check-in staff was very friendly. I have to complain about the behaviour of security staff. They were practically barking at people to put everything into the box, arrogantly lifting eye brows if you forgot to take off your watch. I haven´t experienced such a rude attitude from airport security staff anywhere else so far. After this unpleasant experience you get into the duty free shops and Café area where you are asked many times if you want to sign up for a new credit card or if you want to buy cosmetics. It was annoying. Gate number was not displayed until 35 minutes before departure, after 5 minutes the assigned gate was changed again. Overall not so pleasant experience.

I was travelling to and from Frankfurt and due to the fact that it was not that busy, Budapest airport was a great experience. The staff were nice, hardly any queues. The only thing did not like is were sales people of different banks in the lounge, pretending to help you with finding your way but in the end they want to sell you credit cards. I don't mind direct sales, just do not pretend to help with anything.

My overall experience is really positive. The staff were friendly and smiling, it was really clean, and the internet connection was free and fast. However, I notices two problems one at the departure the on other at the arrival. I had my both flights to and from Budapest with Wizzair whose base hub is the same airport. But at the arrival and after disembarking the aircraft, we had to "walk" about 7 to 8 minutes to enter the terminal. At the departure, we left the gate to a bus and we stood on the bus for 35 minutes until it set off to where the plane was waiting for us. The funny point is that I had priority boarding pass, and actually with this form of boarding and waiting on the bus, it was absolutely useless.

When we arrived to the airport parking, due a really thick fog we couldn't see even the terminal building. Because the weather our flight was delayed for 14 hours, so we were pushed to overnight. OK, no one can predict this, but I have never seen more indifferent airport staff. No one there was able to give us any useful information, about the flight, acomodation, transfer - nothing. The only thing that they cared about was, if they got home on time. Wifi broke down, when the 100 phones tried to find some accommodation. No place to seat, almost no shops. I'll try to avoid this airport in future.

Security process inefficient and needs to be redesigned. Adds level of stress to an already difficult process. I was asked to remove shoes because the staff member said they were "boots" but she ignored my thick fleece over jumper. Hard to remove shoes while juggling trays on short conveyor belt. Very clean and good choice of shops but prices are astronomical even by airport standards. A pencil case was Euro 14. Seriously who is buying this tat at inflated prices. Does not leave a good impression on departing customers. Interesting that the departure lounge and experience more attractive than the arrivals experience.

Budapest Ferihegy Airport is not the best. I travel from here about 10-12 times a year. Good things: clean, good restrooms, observation terrace, nice exterior (except low-cost terminal) and friendly staff. Bad things: Awful public transport, expensive duty-free shop and restaurant, awful, degrading low-cost terminal, slow, and bad wifi.

A nice airport which was clean and signs easy to follow. The viewing platform is brilliant to pass the time if you have to wait a long time, however, we did feel it was a bit overpriced as it is just literally a viewing platform, unlike LHR's T4 with tablets with flightradar24 installed on them. The people at security and bag check were extremely rude and just glared at you and threw the plastic trays at you and picked up your luggage and threw it to you so they could get more trays.

I travel to and from this airport every 3-4 months, and have been doing so for at least 3 years now. While they've done a bunch of upgrades throughout the facility, there is still a lot to be said for improvements in service. Generally, since the flagship carrier Malev went bust 3 years ago, the "flagship" airline of Hungary is a budget company called Wizz Air. When your flagship airline is a budget airline, by default everything becomes a challenge. Up until recently, even with Platinum or Gold status with Skyteam, you'd still have to pay 5 Euro or so for the Priviledge Pass to bypass the predictably slow and cumbersome security process for departures. The service and standards for the security controls is not logical and consistent, so each time you come it is a total surprise. I assume that is why the lines are constantly long, as nobody can ever prepare for the whim of whoever is responsible for the security check lanes of the day. Arrivals is always a disaster with very long lines and people cutting, as there is no clear separation of lines. You have a mix of little budget airlines such as Wizz Air and Ryan Air landing, getting mixed along with the jumbo jets from Qatar or Turkish Airlines which at the end is painful for everyone. On the positive end, the food is very cheap in the common areas compared to Western Europe, Asia, and American airports.