Personal-item and cabin-bag dimensions across every major low-cost airline, plus how strictly each one enforces the gate sizer.
Personal item dimensions
Every budget airline includes one 'personal item' or under-seat bag in the base fare. The published dimensions are smaller than most travel-rated daypacks. Confirmed 2025–2026 limits:
- Ryanair: 40 × 20 × 25 cm (under-seat only)
- easyJet: 45 × 36 × 20 cm, most generous in Europe
- Wizz Air: 40 × 30 × 20 cm
- Vueling: 40 × 20 × 30 cm
- Volotea: 40 × 30 × 20 cm
- Transavia: 40 × 30 × 20 cm
- Spirit Airlines: 18 × 14 × 8 in (45 × 35 × 20 cm)
- Frontier Airlines: 18 × 14 × 8 in
- Allegiant: 16 × 15 × 7 in (smaller than US norm)
- AirAsia: 40 × 30 × 10 cm + max 7 kg combined with cabin bag
- Volaris: 45 × 35 × 20 cm + 10 kg combined
Carriers that explicitly include 'fits under the seat in front of you' in their published rules are the strictest at gate enforcement.
Larger cabin bag dimensions (paid)
If you pay for a cabin-bag upgrade (Priority Boarding on Ryanair, WIZZ Priority, easyJet large cabin bag, Big Front Seat on Spirit), the allowance jumps to a more conventional carry-on size:
- Ryanair Priority bag: 55 × 40 × 20 cm, 10 kg
- easyJet large cabin bag: 56 × 45 × 25 cm, 15 kg
- Wizz Air Priority cabin bag: 55 × 40 × 23 cm, 10 kg
- Vueling Priority cabin bag: 55 × 40 × 20 cm, 10 kg
- Spirit carry-on: 22 × 18 × 10 in, 22 lb soft cap
- Frontier carry-on: 24 × 16 × 10 in (10 in includes wheels and handles)
- AirAsia paid cabin bag: 56 × 36 × 23 cm, 7 kg total with personal item
Crucially, your paid carry-on plus any personal item must fit the combined weight cap on most carriers. Two 5 kg backpacks will pass; one 5 kg backpack plus one 6 kg roller exceeds the 10 kg cap on Wizz Air.
How strictly is the gate sizer enforced
Enforcement varies by carrier and even by base airport. The toughest, in our experience: Ryanair (especially at Stansted, Bergamo, Beauvais), Wizz Air on full flights, and Spirit on Florida departures. The softest: easyJet on UK domestics, Vueling at Barcelona, AirAsia at lightly-loaded gates. Every carrier reserves the right to enforce the sizer; do not assume yesterday's pass means tomorrow's pass.
Pay for the larger cabin bag at booking if your bag is borderline. The ten-euro upgrade is dramatically cheaper than the gate-side surcharge if a sceptical agent decides your wheels stick out.
How to actually measure your bag
The published dimensions include wheels and handles. A bag stamped '22 × 14 × 9, fits all airlines' often does not, because the wheels add 2 cm and the top handle adds 1 cm when collapsed. Measure your bag fully packed, with everything in place. If the longest side is even 1 cm over the published limit, you are at the agent's discretion.
Soft-sided bags compress better than hard-shell rollers and often clear sizers that hard-shells fail. If you fly multiple LCCs, a packable backpack is the most flexible choice.
Per-airport gotchas
Stansted, Beauvais, and Bergamo are notorious for systematic sizer enforcement on Ryanair flights. Madrid Barajas T4 and London Gatwick North are more relaxed. AirAsia at KLIA2 weighs combined personal-item-plus-cabin-bag at the boarding gate; AirAsia at Don Mueang almost never does. Weigh and measure as if every gate is the strictest.
Sources & further reading
The fees, allowances and procedures cited in this guide are cross-checked against carrier and regulator publications. For primary sources and official rulings, see:
- IATA, international airline trade body; canonical source for IATA codes, baggage tracking standards and industry statistics.
- ICAO, UN civil aviation agency; the authoritative reference for ICAO codes, safety standards and global aviation policy.
- OpenFlights public dataset, the open airport, airline and route dataset that powers the directory side of FlightHaven.