How far in advance are you planning to arrive at MCO?

[epcotobsessed]

I am seeing and reading horror stories about airport crowds, including MCO. We leave next week for our first trip post-pandemic and have found MCO security to be pretty disorganized, with long waits, even on a "good" day, so I'm thinking we should arrive at 4pm for our 7pm flight home, maybe even earlier. I'm curious what others are thinking about this? Thanks.

 

[rwdavis2]

Do you have precheck? If so entering the terminal 2 hours prior is probably fine.

 

[epcotobsessed]

We don't, and it's sheer laziness on my part (well, I'll also blame my husband on this one as well!) We really need to just do it.

 

[EACarlson]

I would go at least two, maybe three. What is your backup plan if you miss the flight for whatever reason? Does your airline have another flight to get you home?

Get Precheck, in the two years I've had it, it has saved me over three hours in security lines. If you book today there is a chance you can get your TT# before you leave next week.

 

[MrKnight]

If you are checking bags and going through regular security screenings (no precheck/clear/etc.), I would recommend arriving 3 hours prior to your flight just to be safe, MCO is one of the busiest airports in the country right now and crowds have been hitting record levels recently.. Better to be early than late..

 

[DisneyTeacher]

We flew out mid morning on June 13. The line to check our luggage for SWA was long but moved quickly, we probably didn’t wait more than 20 minutes before we were printing our luggage tags. When we got to security there were no lines, we walked right up to a TSA agent, breezed through and had a short line to screen our carryons and person. Probably the easiest we’ve ever had at MCO. That said, I would allow three hours, I can’t imagine the stress of missing a flight.

 

[G719]

We flew out of MCO on June 8 in the afternoon. We used a shuttle service not magic express so we got dropped off at the curb and used curbside check in for southwest. You have to tip them but it was well worth it when I saw the line at the counter. We have pre check and there was no line there. We had 2 of our bags searched. One was because of a bag of trading pins. The other had one of those warmies animals that you can use as a heating pad. After he got checked out, we were on our way. We had plenty of time arriving 2 hours early.

 

[epcotobsessed]

Thank you everyone. I typically like to get to the airport early but find MCO to be not that great when it comes to amenities/food choices, so this is my one exception. We have never missed a flight, knock on wood, and want to keep that track record going, so even though we aren't checking bags we will be sure to get there at least 2.5-3 hours early. We have literally never had no security line in 20+ trips but I'm happy to hear of some recent experiences with this and maybe we'll get lucky!