Stansted to Dublin flights: airlines, times and fares

Ryanair flies Stansted to Dublin, and on this route it is effectively the only direct option. Aer Lingus, the other big name on the London-to-Dublin market, flies from Heathrow rather than Stansted, so from Stansted the choice is Ryanair. As the airport's largest airline, Ryanair runs the route at high frequency and at the kind of low fares the Stansted-to-Dublin market is known for.

Like the rest of Ryanair's network, this is a hand-luggage-first product. A small personal item is included, but a larger cabin bag, a checked bag and a chosen seat are each an extra, so the headline fare is rarely the final price. The airlines at Stansted page sets out what the fare does and does not include before you book.

Dublin is the single busiest route from Stansted, which shows in the timetable: around 8 flights a day, roughly 55 to 60 a week, with the first leaving near 06:30 and the last in the late evening around 22:50. That gives you more flexibility than any other route from the airport, and a missed flight is usually a short wait rather than a lost day.

It is a year-round route, not a seasonal one, carrying people visiting family and travelling for work as much as for holidays, so the high frequency holds up through the winter. The exact count still moves a little with the season, so check the live departures board or Ryanair directly for your date and confirm the departure times when you book.

The flight takes about 1 hour 20 minutes on the published schedule, gate to gate. The airport's own Dublin page quotes a flight time of 1 hour, which is nearer the time actually in the air across the Irish Sea; the booked block usually allows more for taxiing, departure queues and holding. The straight-line distance is around 290 miles.

As on the other short routes, the air time is the smallest part of the day. Set against it are the trip out to Stansted, the airport's recommended two-hour security buffer, and the bus from Dublin Airport into the city at the far end. Budget for those legs at either end rather than the flight time alone when you plan your arrival.

Stansted to Dublin is one of the cheapest routes on the board. One-way fares start at roughly £13 to £18 with Ryanair when booked ahead, and on quiet midweek dates a return can come in very low. These are lead-in fares: they climb as the flight fills and as you get closer to departure, and booking around six weeks out tends to beat a last-minute price.

Because the fare is so low to begin with, the extras matter more here than on most routes. A cabin bag larger than the free personal item, a checked bag and a chosen seat can each cost as much as the flight, so compare the all-in cost rather than the screen price, and book directly with the airline. The fares quoted here are indicative, so check the live price on the airline's own site before you commit.

Ireland and the UK share the Common Travel Area, so there is no routine passport control for British and Irish citizens flying between Britain and Ireland, and Ireland is not in the Schengen area. That does not mean you can travel without identification. Ryanair requires a valid passport or national identity card to board its UK-to-Ireland flights, and it does not accept a UK driving licence, so in practice you need to carry your passport even though no officer will stamp it.

Other nationalities follow the normal Irish entry rules, which can mean a visa, so check your status before you book rather than assuming the Common Travel Area covers you. The simplest rule for everyone: treat this like an international flight for documents, bring your passport, and confirm exactly what your airline accepts on its own travel-documents page in good time.

Dublin is one of a small number of airports worldwide with US preclearance. In Terminal 2 you clear US immigration, customs and agriculture checks before you board, so when you land in America you walk off as a domestic arrival with no border queue, and your bags are checked through to your final destination. For a Stansted traveller, that turns Dublin into a one-stop gateway to the US, reached on a cheap Ryanair hop.

The catch is how you build the trip. From Stansted this is a self-transfer on separate tickets: you fly Ryanair to Dublin, then take a transatlantic carrier such as Aer Lingus onward. That means collecting and re-checking your bags at Dublin, allowing plenty of time (Dublin Airport advises arriving about three hours before a long-haul flight), and accepting that you have no airline protection if the first flight runs late and you miss the connection. You also need an approved ESTA under the Visa Waiver Programme, or a visa, applied for at least 72 hours ahead.

At Stansted, be at security at least two hours before departure, the airport's own recommendation, and allow more for the early-morning Dublin departures. Your gate and satellite show on the departures board and vary by flight: most gates are reached by the airside transit, while Satellite 3 is a walk of around 15 minutes, so check the board and leave time.

At the Dublin end, the airport has no rail link yet, so the usual route into the city is by bus: Airlink, Dublin Express and Aircoach all run frequently and reach the centre in about 30 to 40 minutes. For the trip to Stansted itself, the flight information hub links the live boards, check-in and the pre-flight detail, and the wider Stansted route map shows where else the airport flies.