Brisbane airport ranked as the most stressful in Australia
If you’re heading away this year you may want to check if you are travelling from one of Australia’s most stressful airports.
Our 2024 Stressful Airport index has analysed different stress-inducing factors to reveal the best and worst airports to travel from.
Brisbane Airport was ranked as the most stressful and Canberra Airport the least.
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How can you make the trip less stressful?
How did we rank the airports?
We looked at factors such as passenger numbers, driving distance from the city centre, number of destinations that can be flown to, the cost of parking and overall satisfaction score.
The results
After looking at ten of Australia’s busiest airports against this criteria we found Brisbane to be the most stressful due to having the third highest number of annual passengers (19,793118) and over 70 destinations to fly to.
It was also the most expensive airport for parking, costing travellers $214 for one week.
Canberra ranked as the best airport to fly to and from, it also had a satisfaction score of 85 on FlightRadar, the highest out of all of the airports.
When it comes to passenger movement, Canberra ranked as one of the least busiest with 2,711,821 annual passengers. This could be due to the airport only travelling to 12 destinations in total.
Australia’s busiest airport is Sydney Airport, with 97 destinations to choose from and 35,585,080 annual passengers, this airport is the main gateway for people in and out of the country.
Despite being the busiest airport, Sydney had one of the cheapest parking options available at $115 for one week.
Gold Coast ranked as the second most stressful airport despite only flying to 15 destinations.
This airport is also a 16.71 mile drive from the city centre, the furthest out of all the airports in the index.
When it comes to the cost of parking, Gold Coast Airport ranked as the second most expensive, costing travellers $165 for just one week.
How can you make the trip less stressful?
If you’re travelling to or from any of these airports there are a few things you can do to try and make your experience as stress free as possible.
It’s certainly worth asking a friend or family member to drop you off at the airport to prevent you from having to pay expensive car parking fees.
And if you’re flying from one of the busier airports such as Sydney, Brisbane or Melbourne then be sure to leave yourself plenty of time to check in and go through security before your flight.
For domestic flights travellers should aim to arrive around one to two hours before their flight. For international flights allow three hours.
Where possible, always check in online to save yourself the hassle of waiting in queues at the airport.
For a smooth journey when you’re in the airport, keep your passport and boarding pass in a secure place that’s easy to access. Keeping your passport buried at the bottom of your bag will only make it difficult to get out as you make your way through the airport checkpoints.
Make sure you are not carrying any liquid or gel items in your bag that are over 100ml. This can also waste time when going through security.
Methodology
Sources correct as of June 2024
- Passenger numbers and airports – Airport traffic data from the Bureau of Infrastructure, Transport and Regional Economics. Figures taken from 2022-23 – https://www.bitre.gov.au/sites/default/files/documents/WebAirport_FY_1985-86-2022-23.xlsx
- Destinations (correct as of 12/07) – https://www.flightsfrom.com/
- Flight radar score (correct as of 12/07) – https://www.flightradar24.com/
- Car parking.- each airport’s website. Dates selected were 21st – 28th July, 7am – 7pm, cheapest International T1 option. For airports with no T1 option, cheapest parking was selected. For Canberra, parking calculator was used (accurate as of weds 15/07)
- Driving distance measured in miles (search – airport name to city name) (correct as of 12/07) – https://www.mapdevelopers.com/distance_from_to.php
