Southwest Airlines has a unique model for seating passengers. Whereas most airlines give you a seat assignment when you book a ticket (though increasingly more and more airlines are starting to charge if you want to pick your own seat), Southwest just assigns you a “boarding position”. They also offer a way called Early Bird to get a better seat so if you’re considering that, you might wonder if Southwest Early Bird check in is worth it
What is Early Bird check in?
What is Early Bird check in? With your purchased Southwest ticket, you get a boarding position, which is either in the A, B or C group and goes from 1-60. A1 is the very first person that gets to board the plane, and C60 would be the last (though typically it doesn’t go quite that high).
Southwest has an “open seating” policy, so as soon as you board the plane, you can just pick any open seat. There is a lot of discussion about whether you can save seats on Southwest – my personal opinion is no.
How does Early Bird check in work?
Southwest Early Bird check in is something that you can buy for each. It costs $15 (up from $12.50 as of March 2016) per ticket per direction. So our family of 8 would need to pay $200 to get Early Bird for a roundtrip ticket.
Normally on Southwest, you can check in 24 hours before your flight starts, and you pretty much HAVE to check in right at the 24 hour mark, or else you’re going to be very low in the boarding process. I’ve checked in 10 minutes after the 24 hour mark and been in the high Bs. The way that Southwest Early Bird check in works is that you are automatically checked in 36 hours before your flight (12 hours before everyone else), so in theory you’ll have a pretty early boarding group and have no problem finding a good seat with plenty of overhead space
Is Southwest Early Bird check in worth it?
So, is Southwest Early Bird check in worth it? In my experience, Southwest Early Bird check in is not worth it, except in rare cases. If you’re traveling by yourself or with just 1 or 2 other people, as long as you can check in right at the 24 hour mark, in my experience you’ll get a decent boarding group (anywhere from the high A to low or middle B group)
In that case, I’d say Southwest Early Bird is NOT worth it – just check in 24 hours before your flight, and you’ll be fine
If you are the type of person that has trouble remembering things like that, Southwest Early Bird check in may be worth it to you, since if you’re in the back of the C group, it will be tough to find seats together with the rest of your traveling party.
Is Southwest Early Bird worth it for families?
If you’re traveling with a family, you might wonder if Southwest Early Bird check in is worth it. A lot of that depends on whether you have a child 6 or under (or one that can PASS as 6 or under!). Southwest has a fairly decent policy for family travel, and families traveling with kids 6 or under get to board between the A and B groups. So that means no more than 60 (ish) people have boarded before you. When we used 170,000 Rapid Rewards points to fly from Chicago to Reno, I wondered if Early Bird check in was worth it. In the end, the cheapskate in me won out, and I was glad that even without Southwest Early Bird checkin, our family of 8 had no trouble finding seats together. Yes, we were in the back of the plane, but that was not a problem. Though then we still have the problem of how to arrange 8 people in seats that only go 3 across!!
So if you’re wondering whether Southwest Early Bird check in is worth it, I would say that the answer is no for 90% of people, especially if you’re traveling with kids 6 or under or can be online exactly 24 hours before your flight departs. In both of those cases, even without Southwest Early Bird check in, you should not have a problem finding decent seats with your whole traveling party.
Readers – what has been your experience? What’s your call on if Southwest Early Bird check in is worth it?
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Dan Miller travels with his wife and 6 (SIX!) children. He loves to help families travel for free / cheap, especially larger families. If you are looking for help, drop him an email at 
“I’d say Southwest Early Bird is NOT worth it – just check in 24 hours before your flight, and you’ll be fine”
For many folks this is 100% the correct answer.
However I will happily pay $15 at times to not have to worry about checking in 24 hours before my flight.
A couple of weeks ago I flew Las Vegas – Austin on Southwest. 24 hours before my flight I was even in my hotel room! I was preparing for the Freddie Awards and just wasn’t going to make it a priority to check in. The relatively small amount of cash was worth it, boarding B6 I still managed to snag an exit row aisle.
The time before that I flew Southwest I was in meetings 24 hours before my flight. I wasn’t going to duck out of a meeting to check in (or do it in the middle of the meeting). Again, I was happy to pay not to have to worry about checking in 24 hours in advance.
You can check in 24 hours out, or you can pay not to have to worry about it, depending on your particular circumstance. In my case it’s been worth the cost precisely because checking in 24 hours out would have meant a tradeoff that was even more costly for me.
Agree – I think that’s the one time when Southwest Early Bird check in might be worth it – when you’re not able to check in right at 24 hours, and the 2 reasons you suggest (early flight and not wanting to get up early 2 days in a row) and other commitments that prevent you from checking in.
Its a case by case situ – if your on connector or popular flights you know are always full or near full its worth it. But of course on less popular its easy to get A’s checking in on the 24hr dot!
I have had a regular flight back and forth – its ALWAYS packed – I check in on the 24hr dot – best I’ve had is A47 worse B43 – boy SouthWest jets ARE cattle trucks and when ignorant people bring on TWO large carry ons (SouthWest dont care) its no fun sitting with your bag under your feet cramped up in the middle seat – Early Bird in this case YESSS
I just did this earlier today for a flight leaving tomorrow evening. I ended up with B53. My fiancé who had a separate reservation ended up with B54. I’m not sure how that logic works. I do not think it was worth it, and would not do it again.. unless as the writer said, I could not check in right at the 24 in advance mark.
I have only used early-bird check in once, both as a convenience and as a trial to see if there was value in using it in the future. I was travelling alone and used it on the outbound leg of a round trip. Both flights were direct, the outbound leg a very early AM departure and I didn’t want to be up that early 2 days in a row. The result of early bird was I got a mid-B boarding pass. Pretty weak. For the flight home, I checked in within a few minutes of the 24 hour mark, and was issued a similar mid-B position. I am usually diligent about checking in right at the 24 hour mark and normally get high-A to low-B. The take away, for an early AM flight there were probably 30 others like me who didn’t want to wake up that early twice in a row. No real measurable value for my $12.50. Although its unlikely that the whole will buy early bird, there is nothing to stop them and someone has to get A16, and someone else has to get C41 so I see no value in the opaque process of paying for a reserved spot in line!
I forgot about that “feature” of Southwest Early Bird check in – that it’s all dependent on how many OTHER people sign up for it. So in your case, you paid the $12.50, but so did a lot of other people, and you got a “bad” middle B boarding pass
I tried twice and decided its total not worth for me.
Both the time I tried, I got Early Bird Check-In Pass for 2 tickets out of 4 and Checked in 2 tickets exactly 24 hours early. Both the times I got As(one Mid A’s and other time A16 and A40ish) for the 24 hour checked in tickets and the early bird check-ins were mid B’s.
I felt like a fool as Early Bird Check-in both the time got me Mid-Bs where as 24 hour check-in both the times got me As(Including one A16)
Another option is if you haven’t already used the airline credit on a CC, this qualifies. I usually add Early Bird later, after making the flight reservation, so it’s easy for it to be spotted by a service rep when calling for the statement credit. “Free” early seating.
I was successful getting Early Bird covered by Amex Platinum credit for awhile in 2015, but then they got more strict toward end of the year. I switched to using it for gift cards, but Southwest doesn’t take those for early bird.
You can not get A 1-15 with early bird. SW saves those for p
Upgrades at the gate. We normally get A15-30 and normally do early bird.
not worth it at all. esp when one early boarder saves 5 seats for her family and you can’t get the seat you really wished to have.
Yeah – hate seat savers 🙁
I recall the days where very few people used http://www.southwest.com for check-in, and you’d be guaranteed an A18 or A20 – never anything worse than A30. Then more and more people, especially younger folks, slowly permeated into usage. Finally older folks as well. I’ve never used early bird – its a sham. If you have a smart-phone just set a soft timer 5 min before the 24hr mark and check-in by mobile. $30 is quite a bit of money. It’s ~ 30% of ticket price on the $49 each way RT ticket. Aside from a couple rare occurence, I’ve never been worse than B30 with 24 hr before. In those case you sit towards the rear and you still should have a seat pick unless there are many through-passengers (you’re in Midway or Phoenix or other Southwest hub).
It’s a rip off. I purchased it only to get wrong information and still ended up with B boarding. I could have just checked in 24 hours before and I’m sure I would have gotten betterika.anaya.k81o@statefarm.com boarding. I’m really over Southwest..
I think it’s a scam, I don’t need to pay
I wish I would had read the reviews before buying the Early Bird check in. I purchased Early Bird for my flight from Pittsburgh to Las Vegas and got B28. Coming to Pittsburgh checking in on my phone 24hrs before I got B4. My connecting flight up to Sacramento I got A57. Going to LAX from Sacramento, checking in 24hrs before on my phone I got A 24.
Totally not worth it in my opinion. I think I would have got a better position if I had checked in on my phone. So now Southwest has my $15 and I honestly believe I’m in a worse position then if I had checked in 24hrs before on my phone.
I am new to Southwest and will be flying from ATL to FLL in May. I was considering the early bird check in because the website SAYS early birds check in 36 hr before the flight. So if everyone else checks in 24 hr before, how is it the 36 hr early bird checkins are getting later numbers? Am I confused? Someone please help me understand. Seems like every early bird would get a number before because they are checkedin 12 hrs before check in opens for everyone else. Please help. thanks
It depends on the flight. Are you traveling by yourself or with a party? Generally I’ve found that if you can check in right at the 24 hour period you won’t have a problem getting a decent seat
You have to read carefully. It doesn’t say you check in 36 hours before the flight. It says you check in *within* 36 hours before the flight.
That means any time from 1 second to 36 hours before the flight the condition is met. Great bargain huh?
Southwest boards their airplanes this way rather than traditional assigned seating because it brings out the competitive nature of human beings. By instinct, we want to be ‘first’ and conveniently they offer a seaming solution, for a price.
According to the site: “EarlyBird Check-In Customers will have their boarding positions reserved beginning 36 hours prior to their flight’s scheduled departure time. Boarding Passes can be accessed beginning 24 hours prior to the flight’s scheduled local departure time.”
This implies the spot is reserved before the 24-hr checkins.
Actually, your early bird position will be affected by how many early bird check-ins are at higher fare categories. They go in order of time of purchase within each fare grouping, so early birds in Business Select will be assigned a position before those in Wanna Get Away.
If you order an Early Bird check in when you book your flight (more than 60 days in advance of your flight, does that assure you a better place in line or does the 24 hour rule still apply?
Here is another data point on whether early-bird is worth it.
My wife and I were flying from baltimore to phoenix. The flight was at mid-day on a Wednesday. I didn’t think it would be terribly crowded, but my wife bought early-bird just in case, and I didn’t. The day before the flight I set two browser windows to the southwest check-in page on my computer, with our respective check-in information loaded and ready to go. At exactly 24 hours before check-in, I hit the check-in buttons on the browsers (hers first, mine no more than 1 second later).
The result? My wife got B27, I got C28.
Hers was disappointing given that she paid for early-bird, and if I had not seen how bad mine was, I would have said that early-bird was a total waste.
Perhaps for heavily traveled routes, early-bird is evolving into a required surcharge to ensure you do not sit in a middle seat.
It would be nice if you could check on your flight as you get closer to departure to see how many folks have already bought early-bird tickets. Then people might be better able to decide if it is worth $15 not to be stuck in a middle seat between strangers for several hours.
Here is a guide I put together to setup your own automatic check-in at Southwest using a simple browser extension and script someone wrote. I’m not very computer saavy and was able to set it up in a few minutes. It does the job for me when I can’t be at a computer exactly at the 24 hr mark. Let me know if you need any help setting up. Thanks – http://www.theartoftravelhacking.com/automatic-check-southwest-flights/
I signed up and paid for early-bird approximately 32 hours before my flight because I am travelling with my 2 children (ages 8 & 11). Then I went and checked in exactly 24 hours before our flight and got B13 – B15 boarding positions. I have no idea what I paid $45 dollars for. What a rip off.
I have checked in many times right exactly at the 24 hour time…and ended u with C almost every time. But we have always found seats together…although often it is at the very back of the airplane. But it would cost 60.00 to get the early bird.
Purchased early bird check in and I received a B27 boarding position. My friend on the same flight checked in without early bird 24hrs before the flight and received an A43 position. I called in and was told that they are sorry but early bird check in is non refundable. They will move it to my return flight, but didn’t do anything else for me. I’ll be speaking with them upon arrival in hopes that they will do something more, I haven’t had problems in the past. I will definitely be going without early bird on future flights though.
I have never fallen for Early Bird. It was a scam at $10, and now a screaming scam at $15. I’ve been able to get high A’s or low B’s at the ~1-3s mark @ 24hr mark every time. Ask yourself this, what if everyone bought earlybird? You’d still have to have high B’s and C’s (paying).
There should be a money-back guarantee if you get above an A at the very least. Southwest has twisted their open-seating “policy” for profit. Buyer beware.
I have been flying SWA all year on a companion pass with my spouse. I have always paid for Early Check in and am 100% confident it is a SCAM. I always check in exactly on time and have been in the High B’s several times with people around me with no status and no early check in. IF SWA truly assigns your boarding position 36 hours prior then why don’t you send it to me or display it on line 36 hours prior. In reading the comments above others have witnessed the same “injustice” yet nothing is being done about it with SWA. I almost feel like starting a Twitter storm on this one. Also, on a separate side of SWA as a Companion I must travel with my spouse. However, My spouse checked and received a boarding position. He then asked me what I received as I have EBC and always check in ON TIME. I told him I didn’t checkin as we weren’t departing for 2 more days. Well, SWA booked me on the same flight just a day later than my companion. OMG. I called SWA and asked how they booked me on a companion pass not with the main traveler and needed to be moved to the correct flight AND I want an A boarding position. Get this, they did move me but told me they couldn’t accommodate a better position. I ended up with C. SWA told me that their systems wouldn’t let them do that yet it certainly will let them book a companion on the wrong flight for the wrong day without the main traveler. Hmmm….Coming from the IT industry and have great knowledge of the SWA systems let me tell you (my opinion) they have a lot of people in IT that have NO clue about new technology and if they bought any new software they would be out of jobs and therefore they stick with this “stuff”. Do NOT pay for EBC.
What happens if a large number of passengers on the same flight purchase Early Bird?
I’d imagine then the ones at the end who purchased it latest will get bad (worse) results
I think a lot of the negative comments regarding early bird not being worth it is related to a general misconception on how EB actually works. Part of the fault lies with SW for not providing a detailed summary regarding EB. However, they do provide all the information in broken up sections in their EB FAQ page. Here is how boarding priority works with SW in terms of the 36 hour EB/24 hour regular check in:
1. Business Select
2. Rapid Rewards A list member
3. Anytime fare with EB check in
4. Anytime fare
5. Wanna get away with EB check in
6. Wanna get away
How does this work in real life? I will provide an easy to understand extreme example: Lets say there are 120 people for a flight. They are broken up as follows: 4 business, 10 RR, 5 anytime with EB, 1 anytime, 45 wanna get away with EB, 55 wanna get away. According to SW rules, the 1 anytime fare purchaser without EB has AUTOMATIC priority over the categories below him. Meaning even if he checks in 15 minutes before the 24 hour check in deadline, he will be given a A-20 boarding pass.
So with that in mind here is how a wanna get away purchaser with EB could end up with a middle to late B boarding pass. Keep in mind that this example is only for very popular/busy routes. Most of the time you will get a good position with an EB purchase unless you get REALLY unlucky.
A flight was 143 (full flight) passengers. 11 business, 13 RR, 10 anytime with EB, 25 anytime, 45 wanna get away with EB, the rest are regular wanna get away. This means that the best spot that the wanna get away EB passenger with the earliest time stamp can get is A-59. So lets say you book with flight 3 days before departure and pick EB. This means your going to have one of the last time stamps for EB passengers with wanna get away. So if your the EB has the last time stamp, your going to be given B-44.
A lot of people think that getting EB with wanna get away means that they are at the top of the list and will most likely get an A boarding pass. This is generally true IF you do several things correctly:
1. Your not booking a very popular route. Please understand that off the top of my head only about 15% of all their flights fall into this category. For the rest of the flights EB can be a good purchase
AND
2. You purchase your ticket early. EB check in goes by the time stamp of the purchase date/time in your class so the earlier you buy your ticket the better position you will receive.