Live model · Airplane boarding
How Airplane Boarding Actually Works
The fastest way to board a plane lets passengers stow their bags at the same time instead of one after another. Boarding back to front sends everyone headed for the same few rows into the aisle together, so they wait on each other. Random order beats it, and Steffen's method, window seats in alternating rows first, beats both.
Back to front, a second at a time
- CH1 Walking
- CH2 Stuck behind someone
- CH3 Stowing a bag
- CH4 Random order, same passengers
How to read the stage
The grid is the cabin from above, nose to the left: 12 rows of six seats around one aisle. Each empty seat shows its passenger's place in line, and the key under the stage names who is walking, stuck or stowing a bag. Back to front seats all 72 passengers in 6:41. The dashed line is the same passengers with the same bags boarding in random order: 5:33.
Why back to front is slow
A passenger stowing a bag blocks the aisle, and everyone behind waits. Back to front sends the 24 passengers of rows 9 to 12 down the aisle at once, so after a full minute only 9 are seated and 9 more stand stuck behind one person in row 10. Random order spreads people over the cabin, so several stow at once. Steffen's method puts neighbors in line two rows apart, and the same flight boards in 3:04.
Five orders, the same twenty flights
Each flight boards five ways with the same passengers and bags, so only the order changes. Steffen's method averages 3:03, window-middle-aisle 4:34, random 5:35, back to front 6:44 and front to back 7:42. Back to front beats random order on 0 of 20 flights. Set bags to None and every order speeds up, since the waiting was for bags.
Five orders, the same twenty flights
- CH4 Flights boarded
The field test
In a test published in 2012, Jason Steffen and Jon Hotchkiss boarded 72 passengers with their own luggage into a mock Boeing 757 with 12 rows of six seats, the cabin on this stage. Steffen's method took 3:36, window-middle-aisle 4:13, random 4:44, strictly back to front, row by row from the windows in, 6:11, and three blocks of four rows 6:54. The model's times differ, but its order of the methods is the same.
What the model leaves out
Real passengers walk at different speeds, sit in the wrong seat, board with family, and hunt for overhead space that fills up. The model gives each passenger one random stow time, adds four seconds for each seated passenger in the way, and moves everyone one row a second. Its plane is always full, and everyone shows up in the order called.
Questions
- What's the fastest way to board a plane?
- In simulations and in a field test published in 2012, Steffen's method: window seats first, on one side, in every other row from the back, then the other side, then the rows skipped, then middle and aisle seats the same way. In the field test it seated 72 passengers in 3:36, against 4:44 in random order.
- Is boarding back to front faster?
- No. It crowds everyone with nearby seats into the aisle together, so they wait on each other. Steffen's 2008 simulations found it very likely the second worst method, and in the field test it was slower than random boarding: 6:11 against 4:44.
- Why don't airlines use the Steffen method?
- It needs every passenger in an exact place in line, which takes time and space at the gate, and it splits up people traveling together, since passengers next to each other in line sit two rows apart.
- How does Southwest boarding work?
- Southwest switched from open seating to assigned seats on January 27, 2026. It moved from A, B and C boarding groups with numbered positions to Groups 1 through 8, set by fare type, seat type and location, Rapid Rewards status and credit card benefits.