Ryanair Passive Aggressively Changes Family Seating Policy, Blasts Regulators

A couple of weeks ago, authorities in the United Kingdom opened an investigation into Ryanair’s seating policy for families, suggesting it wasn’t complying with regulations. While the airline insists that it has been following rules all along, the company has just updated its policies.

And of course in typical Ryanair fashion, the airline is being catty about it, saying families will likely sit in the back of the plane for free, and that it only adjusted its policy because it doesn’t want to “waste time explaining to misguided regulators how badly they misunderstand” what’s in the best interest of conusmers.

Ryanair reluctantly updates family seating policy

A couple of weeks ago, the United Kingdom’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) opened an investigation into Ryanair’s family seating policy.

The carrier’s old policy was that parents need to sit next to children between the ages of two and 11. Ryanair of course charges for seat assignments, but the company did make one accommodation — while parents would have to pay for their assigned seats, the airline would then offer free adjacent seat assignments for up to four children on the same reservation.

Regulators argued that this was possibly an “unfair contract term” under consumer laws, since only families had to pay for assigned seats, and not others (other passengers could simply roll the dice on the seats they get).

So that brings us to the latest update. Ryanair insists that its old and longstanding family seating policy fully complied with all relevant laws and regulations. The airline makes this argument based on the fact that it didn’t charge any fee for children to sit next to their parents (which is technically true — they instead charged only the adult). Ryanair also argues that the old policy has “given families certainty of seat allocation at the time of booking, which families have valued as much as they have valued Ryanair’s lowest fares.”

But as of June 25, 2026, adults traveling with children, who do not wish to select or pay for a reserved seat, will be advised of their free of charge seat allocation after they have checked in for their flight, as is the case on most airlines in Europe. Families opting for this random allocation of seats will likely be seated toward the rear of the cabin.

Meanwhile families who prefer to choose their seats at the time of booking will now have to pay full price for everyone to secure seats, as the airline claims this matches the policy of most other European airlines.

The airline explains that this change “responds to the desire of Europe’s regulators to stifle innovation and progress.” The airline also claims this will be revenue neutral for it.

Ryanair CEO Michael O’Leary of course has a lot to say

Ryanair CEO Michael O’Leary is one of the most outspoken people in the airline industry, and of course he didn’t hold back in sharing his thoughts on this:

“European regulators such as the UK CMA have consistently failed consumers by ignoring blatant anti-consumer reselling of inflated air fares by unauthorised OTAs, overcharging by airport monopolies and service failures by Europe’s ATCs. Turning a blind eye to the high fares charged by airlines on routes with no Ryanair competition, the CMA has now targeted our family seating policy which has been universally embraced by consumers as the most progressive and transparent in Europe. Instead of promoting competitiveness and lower fares for consumers, the CMA is on a mission to force Ryanair to adopt the less transparent and less consumer-friendly family seating policy applied by most other airlines – just because it’s the industry standard.”

“We will reluctantly adjust to this industry standard as we don’t want to waste time explaining to misguided regulators how badly they misunderstand what is in the best interest of UK and Europe’s consumers. Under our revised family seating policy, families may have to wait until after they have checked in to find out their seat allocation and are more likely to be seated at the rear of the cabin but at least the CMA will be able to claim they have done something for consumers, but sadly most consumers won’t notice.”

Bottom line

Ryanair has long taken a creative approach to its family seating policy. Regulators require airlines to allow children to sit next to their accompanying adults at no extra charge, which Ryanair sort of technically abided by — the carrier’s old policy was to charge the parent for a seat, and then let kids select seats next to them at no extra cost.

With regulators investigating the airline, the policy has now been updated. Ryanair will now assign seats for families at check-in for free, and claims families will typically end up in the back of the plane. Meanwhile the airline is eliminating its discount for family seat assignments in advance, in order to align policies with those of other airlines.

It does seem like Ryanair was taking some liberties with how it interpreted the rules. However, with the airline eliminating the discount for families assigning seats together in advance, I’m not sure everyone will view this change as positive.

What do you make of Ryanair’s seating policy update?