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Why trust this guide? I’m Mark Hartshorne, founder of MyPushchair.co.uk. I started in the coach travel industry in 1993, training under my uncle’s firm in Guiseley and gaining my PSV licence, before joining Gold Crest Holidays in 1995 — eventually running the business and its 30+ year connection with Disneyland Paris. Getting a pushchair through an airport, a train door, or a packed boot isn’t theory for me — it’s something I’ve watched thousands of families do, and done myself more times than I can count.
Travelling with a Pushchair — At a Glance
- Flying: easyJet’s cabin allowance for a pushchair is 56 x 45 x 25cm including handles and wheels — but this isn’t a universal rule. Ryanair and TUI typically don’t test pushchairs against a cabin-locker size at all; they’re gate-checked into the hold regardless of size, often for free. Always check your specific airline’s policy rather than assuming one set of numbers applies everywhere.
- Small cars: folded boot footprint, not seat width, is usually the real constraint.
- Buses and trains: width and a fast, reliable fold matter more than almost anything else.
- Rough ground: a pushchair built for pavements will struggle on woodland paths, beaches, or cobbles.
- Disneyland Paris: has its own specific demands — heat, queue distances, and (for some families) genuine accessibility needs.
Every pushchair works fine in the shop. It’s only once you’re trying to fold it one-handed at a departure gate, or wedge it into a boot that seemed bigger on the test drive, that you find out what it’s actually made of — and that’s really what travel with a pushchair comes down to.
I spent over thirty years sending families on holiday for a living, and the pushchair was very rarely the thing anyone thought to worry about in advance — right up until it became the only thing anyone was thinking about, stood at a check-in desk or a bus stop. Different journeys create different problems: airports reward a compact fold, buses and trains reward narrow width, rough ground rewards bigger wheels and suspension. A pushchair that’s brilliant for one of these can be genuinely poor at another, which is why this page splits travel with a pushchair by situation rather than lumping everything into one generic “best travel pushchair” list.
Travel with a pushchair — start here
| Your situation | Guide to read |
|---|---|
| Flying | Best Pushchairs for Flying |
| Small boot | Best Pushchairs for Small Cars |
| Bus or train | Best Pushchairs for Public Transport |
| Rough ground | Best All-Terrain Pushchairs |
| Disneyland Paris | Best Pushchair for Disneyland Paris |
| Additional needs | Pushchairs for Children with Additional Needs |
By air
Flying with a pushchair is the situation where the gap between “technically allowed” and “actually allowed” causes the most grief. Airports reward a compact fold above almost everything else — it’s the one travel scenario where size genuinely trumps terrain ability or width. Our guide covers what cabin-approved really means, why it’s not a guarantee, and which pushchairs cope best with the realities of baggage handling.
In a small car
The pushchair that looked perfectly reasonable in a showroom can turn into a daily wrestling match with a small boot. This guide covers actual folded dimensions — the number that matters, and the one manufacturers make hardest to find.
Best Pushchairs for Small Cars →
On buses and trains
This is the situation generic pushchair advice handles worst, and it’s the one we’ve researched most thoroughly — using real, daily public transport experience from my daughter and her partner, who use buses and trains across West Yorkshire with two young children every single day. Width is the constant problem: a pushchair that’s a few centimetres too wide turns getting on a bus into blocking the whole aisle, and a fold that takes thirty seconds becomes unworkable with a baby on your hip and a queue building behind you. Doors that don’t open fully, gaps between platform and train, and exactly how fast you need to fold and board are all things you only really learn from doing it daily — not from a spec sheet.
Best Pushchairs for Public Transport →
Coming soon to this hub:
- Pushchairs on Buses
- Pushchairs on Trains
- Double Pushchairs on Public Transport
On rough or uneven ground
Woodland paths, beaches, cobbled town centres — a pushchair built for smooth pavements will fight you on all of them. This is the one situation where width and fold speed barely matter and wheel size and suspension matter enormously — almost the exact opposite priority list to flying or public transport. This guide covers what actually copes, tested on real routes rather than a flat car park.
Disneyland Paris
Disneyland Paris brings its own specific challenges — long days, heat, and queue distances that catch a lot of families out. My background here is a bit different to the rest of this page: I joined Gold Crest Holidays in 1995, the business became Disneyland Paris’s number one UK Leisure Groups commercial partner, and my wife Janette ran the account specifically for 10 of those years.
Disneyland Paris resources
Travelling with additional needs
Travel adds its own layer of complexity if your child has additional needs — queues, transfers, unfamiliar environments, and long days with little room for rest. Our main guide to pushchairs for children with additional needs is the place to start; the Disneyland Paris resources above go deeper on that one destination specifically.
Pushchairs for Children with Additional Needs →
Got a specific trip coming up and not sure how to handle travel with a pushchair? Get in touch — I’m happy to help you think it through.