Lisbon Airport

Probably our worst experience of a European airport in many years - inadequate seating, grossly overcrowded, poor catering facilities, unhelpful staff. Thankfully our flight was not delayed. Low cost airlines should review their use of this terminal, even if it means higher fares. Lisbon city and region should also be concerned, because this will make users think twice about visiting again in the near future, for business or pleasure.

Terminal two (the low cost terminal) is truly horrendous. Why the airport thinks if you are flying on a low cost airline you are ok with sitting on the floor for two hours I don't know. In my experience 'low cost' travellers are savvy frequent flyers, with a propensity to spend at the airport given good facilities, ample seating, good places to eat, and shops to browse. Terminal two therefore doesn't even make commercial sense. It's hot, the seating is hopelessly inadequate, the food and retail is really basic, and I will actively avoid flying from here in the future. Top tip - if you do get stuck here - drop your bag off then get the free shuttle to terminal one, loads of places to eat, relax and shop landside. Then get the shuttle back to t2. Do not go airside in T2 until you really have to. Cattle are treated better than the passengers here.

Arrivals - fine, no problems. Departures from Terminal 2 is awful. The terminal is too small to handle the amount of passengers coming through. Barely any places to sit both in the waiting area and the food court. It was hot and uncomfortable.

Terminal 2 at Lisbon airport is used by Easyjet, there were easily twice as many people in this small terminal as seats, an extremely uncomfortable three hours standing wait. We received a text from Easyjet to arrive early as there were delays due to security problems, there were actually no delays getting through security. The only food available was McDonalds and a very small snack bar. Many people were sitting on the floor as there were no tables free. Absolute disgrace, one of the worst airport experiences we have ever had. We have travelled to Lisbon before with BA which was very good, we will never use Easyjet again!

I travelled there by local line TAP. Arrival: small area easy to pass. EU members no pass control easy access to underground station. Pleasant Staff in underground. Cheap taxi. Departure: quite complicated first self check in (not many places to do that - I recommend to do that in the hotel by web access very helpful Staff) then baggage drop - short queue friendly Staff then long queue to the safety control. Small number of security slots. Friday morning whole entrance to the airport took about 1hr I think that in busier times it could take 2-3hrs!

First the good. Lisbon airport is closer to downtown than nearly every other major city. It also has nice shopping outlets. Now for the bad. Customs inspection process for VAT refund almost seems designed to defeat those seeking refunds. Still we managed. But immigration in Terminal 1 was inexcusable. We arrived at Immigration to find a long queue and were surprised to discover a single immigration officer serving all non-EU citizens. It seems that we arrived while officers were out to lunch. The wait took longer than we expected and we missed our flight. The following day we returned to the airport for our second attempt at departure. This time the non-EU citizen queue was empty with again one counter open. Once we walked up to the officer he informed us that he was not in service and proceeded to raise his voice in disgust when we told him that waiting hall signs were still directing non-EU citizens to his counter. After our stand-up scolding we followed his directions to the EU citizen line just in time to be chided by the new officer for coming to the wrong line. She demanded to know why we would all come to her counter when there was another officer on duty. We had unknowingly wandered into a battleline of friendly fire. Needless to say Lisbon airport's immigration could do for some improved scheduling internal communication and "customer" service training.

Convenient and accessible the airport is also fairly clean and located in the center of the city. Adequate signage everywhere and there also Wi-Fi spots which you can connect on to. Long bus rides to and from planes to terminals as there still aren't enough airport gates. Tourist centers are also conveniently located to advise on transport and sightseeing options. As reviews have mentioned before security staff can be quite rude. In my experience staff at terminal two tend to be politer. At terminal one it's gruff characters who are probably some of the rudest security staff I've ever had the "pleasure" of encountering. Constant boarding pass checks get a little incessant as well.

We had to spend 75 hours in this airport (planned). It was not a nice experience because the resting area was a joke. It is situated between gate 19 and 20 in a very cold spot of the airport. The smell of fuel was horrible and it was also a very noisy and cold place. There were no convenient chairs. We had hoped to sleep for some hours as we had had a night flight we started from Cape Verde one o'clock in the night. The choice in the food court was pizza sandwiches and hamburgers.

Watching Lisbon Airport over and over again I need to state that this airport is doing better every time you are there (T1 terminal). Recently opened new Security Check area improved again the queuing time. Metro station now available and location very close to town center. Food court with Restaurants for every taste and money. As Frequent traveller all over Europe: An above average airport.

Immigration process was very easy. We were the only flight clearing immigration. Customs was a walk through. The rental car counters were a disaster. You must be part of a rental car Club membership with direct access to a vehicle pickup service. The lines for walk up service were in the hours of delay.