Southwest boarding time?

[CapnJacksGirl]

How far in advance of take-off does Southwest begin boarding? Our flight leaves at 6 am and I'm trying to maximize our sleep (at least for some of our group; I can never sleep before WDW!), minimize wait time at the airport, and still be there when boarding begins. I know, that's a lot to ask.

Do they begin boarding a standard period of time ahead of scheduled take-off? What time would we need to be through security to make it for A-group boarding? (Yep, planning ahead to be in that first group which means I'll have been up at 6 am the day before too.)

If it was just me, I'd get there at midnight and be doing Mickey's Hot Dog Dance until it's time to board, but DH and his parents seem to think we need to sleep. Bizarre!

 

[ccgirl]

I just checked their airport arrival time recommendations and it looks like they recommend getting to the MN airports 1 hour before your flight time.

Hope this helps.

 

[goofy4tink]

Most airports will ask you to arrive at the airport about 2 hrs before flight departure. The smaller airports seem to require a bit less time...90 mins or so. Your bags have to be checked in no less than 30 mins before departure. Then you have to go through security, and get to your gate. SW usually starts the boarding process about 20-25 mins before departure..that would be the A group.
For a 6am flight, I really wouldn't plan to arrive less than an hour before departure. Have you considered arriving the night before and getting a hotel room close to the airport??? That might allow more sleeping time. Have everything ready to go the night before, have the kids shower and such then. Then, on that morning, just a quick toothbrushing, a face wash, change and they're good to go.

 

[Missytara]

When I leave that early, and I have a group with me that needs some time, I spend the night at an airport hotel.

If you are trying to time extra sleep down to the minute, then you are going to have trouble getting there on-time from home and should spend the night at a local hotel.

I prefer to be sitting at the gate at least 45 - 60 minutes before my flights leaves. I would rather be an hour early, than two minutes late.

 

[CapnJacksGirl]

The airport hotel idea worked for us a couple of trips ago, when it was just the four of us and we could get to the airport hotel in one car. The problem with this trip is that we have six people, two of which are in car seats, and all the luggage we all require. It will for sure take two of our vehicles to get us there, thus two rooms and two parking charges at the hotel. Plus, some of the hotels charge extra for parking more than 7 days, which we would be doing. I thought of having a couple of family members drop us off at the hotel the night before, but the hotel we used previously (and really liked) leaves for the Humphrey terminal at the bottom of the hour. Leaving at 4:30 wouldn't be early enough, so we'd end up having to leave at 3:30 for a 6:00 flight! We'd get to sleep as late if we stayed at home! I did find a taxi service that is fairly reasonable and has vans, so I think I'm going to go that route and have them get us to the terminal at 4:30. Figuring out how to get to the airport is worse than all my other trip planning!!

 

[richmo]

Personally, I wouldn't want to gamble on trying to show up a little later. You're really only talking about an extra half hour or so of sleep, and it just isn't worth it.

I usually try to show up to the airport a couple of hours before flight time. Sometimes I wind up sitting around for an hour, but sometimes security is slow or traffic getting to the airport is slow or getting in from parking takes time.

I wouldn't take any chances...

 

[rwdavis2]

SW usually begins actually boarding the aircraft around 30 minutes prior to departure.

 

[Lewisc]

For a continuing flight SW will generally begin boarding shortly after the last passenger leaves the plane. Otherwise 20-30 minutes is about right.

 

[Tim Riordan]

Our past experiences with Southwest has been boarding approx. 30 minutes in advance. Depending on when you are leaving (vacation week, holiday) would decide on the wait thru security would be.

 

[paults]

I also heard if you have an A pass and show up while they are boarding B-group they send you to the end on line c-group and IMO that works for me.

 

[SilverMickey]

I would get there early! It really isn't about how much sleep you get that night... but more how well rested you are for the entire week prior to your trip! Rest up well before hand and that one night of less sleep will hurt less. (Or at least i keep telling my hubby that as we have to arrive at the airport at 5am for our next trip! leave the house by 4am)

Have a wonderful trip!

 

[NotUrsula]

According to the MSP website, Security there opens at 4 am.

A 6 am flight is going to be the first flight of the day on that gate, so I would count on "A" boarding being called no later than 30 minutes before scheduled departure. I think that you should be in the boarding line (standing under your little number sign) no later than 5:15 to be sure not to end up missing your boarding position. (With SWA, once boarding starts it tends to go very quickly; all passengers are usually through the doors into the jetway within 15 minutes, sometimes 10.)

As a consolation prize for getting to the gate early, it is possible to snooze a bit in the comfy leather armshchairs before boarding begins.
(Of course, you do have to appoint someone to stay awake and listen for the boarding call.)

Now, what the TSA lines look like at MSP before dawn I couldn't say, because I've never been there. I think you will get a better answer if you amend your thread title to note that this is specifically about MSP.

 

[iloveokw]

One of our SWA flights this last week boarded at at least 30 minutes before and we left the gate 10 minutes early. You never know what kind of traffic you might run into.

 

[rw_hadley]

We also will be taking a 6:00 a.m. flight on Southwest from MSP (this Friday!)
We're planning on getting to the airport no later than 4:45.
It's the Humphrey Terminal, so I'm hoping things will be fairly low key.

 

[rw_hadley]

We also will be taking a 6:00 a.m. flight on Southwest from MSP (this Friday!)
We're planning on getting to the airport no later than 4:45.
It's the Humphrey Terminal, so I'm hoping things will be fairly low key.

I'll try to note what time they start boarding, and let you know (it may not be until after the trip). That will hopefully be useful to you since we'll be taking the same flight from the same airport, but a few weeks earlier.

 

[CapnJacksGirl]

I'll try to note what time they start boarding, and let you know (it may not be until after the trip). That will hopefully be useful to you since we'll be taking the same flight from the same airport, but a few weeks earlier.

That would be great! I've arranged for our van service to pick us up at 3:45 in Ham Lake, so we should be at the airport by 4:30 at the latest. Not much traffic that early in the morning! We've flown out before 7:00 each of our last three trips and have found getting through the Humphrey terminal security to be quite good....not a walk-through but good. Of course, any time you have to get two under-age-five kids through security with all their gear, it's a little time consuming. I figure we should be at the gate by 5:00 without any problem.

I'll look forward to hearing how it goes for you! Enjoy your trip - wish we were going this Friday after all the shoveling I just did today and the temps we're facing all next week. I'll envy your time in the warmth, but my time will come!

 

[Obadiah Stane]

Terminal 2 (Humprhey Terminal) is a breeze to go through. Whenever I have flown out of there I have never arrived more than 1 hour before flight departure time. Of course, I don't have a passel of kids to drag around, either. Now, Terminal 1 can be another story...

 

[rw_hadley]

Took this flight this morning. Boarding began at 5:35 a.m. for the 6:00 a.m. departure.
Humphrey terminal luggage check in and security was super fast.
We got there way early, and did a lot of sitting around.
Enjoyed our first experience with Southwest.

 

[CapnJacksGirl]

Thanks for the report! I hope you have an awesome vacation. You picked a great week to escape Minnesota. Isn't it supposed to be spring?

 

[ruadisneyfan2]

How far in advance of take-off does Southwest begin boarding? Our flight leaves at 6 am and I'm trying to maximize our sleep (at least for some of our group; I can never sleep before WDW!), minimize wait time at the airport, and still be there when boarding begins. I know, that's a lot to ask.

Do they begin boarding a standard period of time ahead of scheduled take-off? What time would we need to be through security to make it for A-group boarding? (Yep, planning ahead to be in that first group which means I'll have been up at 6 am the day before too.)

If it was just me, I'd get there at midnight and be doing Mickey's Hot Dog Dance until it's time to board, but DH and his parents seem to think we need to sleep. Bizarre!

I wouldn't count on getting A passes without buying EBCI. We always did in the past but last week we flew SWA and even with buying EBCI we got A44 & 45 in both directions. Since you have a child under 4 you can family board between As & Bs but that would be for your immediate family, not other traveling with you: your parents, siblings, inlaws, outlaws, etc.