Birminghamairport Reviews 

Horrendous experience.
Arrived early for a flight to Glasgow hoping to get a relaxing meal and drink before flight. First had to wait for bag drop to open.
Then we had well over an hour wait to get through security caused by insufficient lanes open and no-one in charge around to be able to make a decision to open another.
Staff didn't care and were quite abrupt.

Just enough time then left to throw a sandwich down and board plane

I had an extremely unpleasant and humiliating experience at Birmingham Airport security which has completely put me off ever using this airport again.

One member of staff clearly targeted me the moment I entered his queue. He was scowling before I even got to him, and when it was my turn his behaviour was aggressive, hostile, and unnecessary. Despite wearing normal flat pumps (not boots or trainers), he suddenly shouted at me to remove my shoes. He claimed it was “random” – yet nobody else for miles around was asked to do the same. Not one other passenger in the queue was told to remove theirs, including my partner who saw exactly what happened. It was blatantly not random – he singled me out.

I had no socks on and felt extremely vulnerable and humiliated being forced to take my shoes off in front of everyone. As someone with Asperger’s, I found this very distressing and difficult to process. Even another passenger beside me was shocked and agreed his behaviour was rude and targeted.

To make matters worse, he butted into my private conversation afterwards, trying to start an argument, smirking as though he enjoyed making me uncomfortable. The way he barked “Shoes off NOW” was aggressive and on a complete power trip. He definitely picked on me deliberately, and I would have loved to see him try the same with my partner or any other man, rather than me – a woman wearing a lanyard.

This man’s whole manner was rude, intimidating, and unprofessional. He clearly has a chip on his shoulder and should not be working in a public-facing role. If anything, his conduct poses more of a risk than the passengers he is supposed to be screening.

This incident cast a shadow over my weekend and I have not stopped thinking about it since. Truly disgraceful behaviour which has put me off Birmingham Airport for good. If I could leave zero stars, I would.

An hour wait at security. 2 lanes , one moving the other static as priority passengers were coming to front of our queue and not the other. Staff standing around not reacting to situation and tbh very unhelpful. Worst airport we have been at in many yrs of travels AVOID

Very rude and ratter aggressive staff in general - I didn’t have the time to take their name, in addition to the absolute chaos of the construction and long queue - to be fair this wasn’t better before either. Avoid if you can.

KLM flight on Sunday 19 October 2025

Very poor signage to inform where to check in and which queue is which. It shouldn't require staff to constantly be telling people they are in the wrong queue.

There is no baggage drop so even though I had checked in online I still had to queue in the check-in queue to drop my bag.

Check-in opened later than the screens said.

Baggage belt stopped working, a woman came to fix it and disappeared before pressing the start button so someone else had to be called, she was too preoccupied joking about with other staff. All this time there is a huge queue waiting to check in. There was only one check-in desk open so we are all standing in this queue for about an hour and a half. Luckily I am able-bodied but there's no consideration for anyone who might find standing up without a break for an hour and a half physically difficult.
The flight had to be delayed because of this staff incompetence and disorganization, many people on my flight missed their connections.

I have used Birmingham Airport on a few occasions and to date my experiences have been fine. The new additions of e-gates is a helpful measure and the body scanners are accurate and thorough. Chiefly, I am grateful for this airport being where it is, as it means my partner can fly in from Australia and then not have too far a journey for us to get to my home.

After 2 years of refusing to travel through Birmingham airport I made the mistake of flying out of there this evening. With virtually no volume of passengers they somehow managed to create a 30 minute journey through security, seemingly rejecting every single bag for further searching. The departures area still feels like a poundshop experience and the communication regarding delays to flights pathetic. Do not use.

This airport would be perfect but for the long walks to the boarding gates and having to climb two levels of outdoor metal stairs on arrival. Definitely not good for elderly people who have cabin cases or people who have medical conditions and are unaware they have to do this
climb until they exit the plane! I dread to think how much worse it would have been had it been wet or windy!

The only good thing about this airport is the convenient parking, although not cheap most of it is in walking distance to the terminal. Although I don’t smoke I think it is a big mistake to do away with a smoking area, particularly for long haul passengers. The shopping experience has eye watering prices as do food outlets compared to other airports. Not a nice airport experience, I’ll be going back to Manchester.

Awful security experience. Used airport same month over two years and queues were around an hour long. Terrible and small layout you feel penned in as you shuffle along. Staff are not empathetic. No access to toilets without going all the way back down the lifts, pushing through all the crowds and barriers.

Whichever genius thought it a smart idea to use lifts now to get to departures needs suing. And training in airport design, as they clearly have never used one as a passenger. Then after queuing for 40 minutes and cramming pointlessly into lifts to go upstairs (what was wrong with the permanently moving escalators) we’re now funnelled into a small area for security. The gate personnel didn’t have a clue either: when the guy in front of us couldn’t get his pass to work, they let him through, stopped us instead and then looked at the wrong passport for the wrong boarding pass, despite us making it as easy as we could be being the very people on those passports and boarding passes being held up right in front of our faces. A real mess, and this wasn’t even the height of summer.

Dreadful airport. Staff so unfriendly and unhelpful. Security staff slow and disinterested. This must be the worst airport in the UK. Avoid if possible.

We arrived at Birmingham from Tivat yesterday at 4pm. We had a train booked for 17.08. The plane was 30 mins delayed but we still thought we had enough time to catch it.
We had calculated without taking into account passport control at Birmingham airport. It took us well over an hour to get through.
This was an hour + of shuffling interminably slowly through a long winding queue which seemed to have no end. Conditions were such that a lady in front of us fainted.
Apparently several flights had landed at the same time - this appeared to be a surprise to the airport which was clearly not equipped to deal with the situation.
it's appalling that our second city airport is so ill prepared. I'm embarrassed that this will be some people's introduction to the UK.

Used the free 10 minute drop off at Birmingham Airport today but due to the appalling design of the exit it took us over the 10 minutes free, most of this was sitting in the queue

The queue was ridiculous and the exit was total chaos. Being charged for sitting in the exit queue because of the dreadful design is totally unjustified
Unless this was deliberate design to make everyone pay, great scam.

My 5 year old could have designed this better

Disgusting

Everything was OK on our recent flight experience but the carousels were going so fast that strong men were having to run to catch their baggage! This was 17th September off the kalamata flight.
Never had such fast speeding carousels most women could not grab their bags

Organised chaos, extensive queues, idiots jumping the queue and not been challenged.
Nearly an hour to get through customs on arrival.
Lack of facilities (bars/restaurants)
And NO DESIGNATED SMOKING AREA.
Will definitely not be using Birmingham again.

3.5hrs half a plane’s worth of customers had to wait with virtually no communications as to what had happened to our luggage. Airport blaming airline for putting bags on wrong carousel! Lobotomised monkeys could have done a better job than the airport crew

If I could give zero o would

What a hell hole!!!

Money grabbing, inefficient and dirty…

My family and I just flew in from Dalaman Airport in Turkey, on a Monday landing mid afternoon.

We had to wait over 30 mins to get off the aircraft as there was no one ‘ready’ from Swissport!

On walking into the building it was dirty, there was mess on the floor and it felt really unwelcoming.

Going through immigration there were only 3 members of staff visible. One male and two females. The first female couldn’t have looked less interested and the second spent all her time ‘flirting’ with the male! So much for protecting our borders… a joke of a service.

Then on entering the baggage reclaim area what an absolute stink hole!
Basically an untidy and un-cared for warehouse with old and tired carousels.

The men’s toilets were a DISGRACE!
One toilet working, one with the seat broken and the other full with mess and urine on the floor!!!!!

Then to add insult to injury… OVER ONE HOUR to get our bags!
I’ll say that again OVER ONE HOUR to get our bags.

The money grabbing amateurs who run this airport even charge £2 just to use a trolley (non refundable!)…
A service free at Dalaman airport!?!

If the share holders, owners or indeed anyone who is invested in Birmingham Airport has anything other than money grabbing on their mind it really doesn’t show!!!!

Birmingham Airport you should be ashamed of the first impression give of your business, of Birmingham and of England… you should be ASHAMED!

Chaos, chaos, chaos. The upgrade work seems never ending. I’ll go to Manchester until it’s sorted out.