Flying with children: from check-in to landing without the stress

For many parents the flight is the most dreaded part of a holiday. Not so much the flight itself as everything around it: queues, security, luggage, timings, and children to keep calm in a place you can't leave. The good news is that almost all of it can be prepared in advance.

Rules on luggage, liquids, buggies and documents vary by airline and airport: always check your airline's conditions before travelling.

Before booking

• Seats together: with some airlines free seat allocation doesn't guarantee the family sits together; consider choosing seats
• Times: a flight that fits the little ones' sleep, or doesn't mean waking them at 4am, changes the whole day
• Luggage: check what's included for children, especially buggies and car seats
• Documents: every child, even a baby, needs their own valid travel document. More in children's ID cards and passports

Boarding passes and documents in one place

With four passengers there are four boarding passes, plus car hire and accommodation bookings. In KidBox's wallet you upload the ticket PDFs once: the AI reads date, time, seat and code and shows a clean pass to present, available on both parents' phones. Next to them, the children's encrypted ID documents, with expiry dates highlighted.

Check with the airline whether it accepts mobile boarding passes or requires printouts.

The children's hand luggage

Whatever's needed during the flight must be within reach, not in the hold:

• a full change of clothes for the little ones, and a spare T-shirt for the adult
• snacks and water (you can refill a bottle after security)
• for babies, milk and baby food: usually allowed in reasonable quantities beyond the liquids limit, but check the airport's rules
• necessary medicines, with the prescription
• entertainment: books, small quiet toys, headphones, content downloaded offline
• something to suck or chew for take-off and landing, if your paediatrician recommends it for their ears

At the airport

• Arrive with margin: with children everything takes longer
• Security: have liquids and electronics ready to take out; buggies usually go through security and are left at the aircraft door
• The toilet before boarding, always
• Keep moving while you wait: better to tire them out walking in the terminal than on the plane

During the flight

• Slow-release novelty: a new toy every half hour is worth more than all of them at once
• Get up when the seatbelt sign is off, with little ones who can't sit still
• Be patient with yourself: a child crying on a plane is normal, and nearly all the other passengers know it

The shared list

A shared "Flight" to-do list between parents: online check-in, seats, boarding passes uploaded, children's hand luggage, medicines, offline content. Each ticks their own items.

In short

Seats, times and luggage chosen with the children in mind, valid documents for everyone, boarding passes and documents in both parents' wallets, hand luggage with everything needed for the flight, margin at the airport and slow-release entertainment. The flight won't become relaxing. But it'll be over sooner than you feared.