Reviewing Flixbus from Glasgow Airport

Glasgow Airport has benefited from two coach companies adding services (that’s more coach companies than airlines) in 2025. The first to announce a new service was Flixbus, with the company extending some of their already operating Glasgow to Aberdeen route to the airport in April 2025.

The service adds a direct coach service to Stirling, Perth, Dundee and Aberdeen, something the airport has been lacking for a number of years, with Scottish CityLink not operating any services to these destinations, it appears Flixbus has possibly spotted a gap in the market and is trying to capitalise on this.

I decided to try out one of their services from Glasgow Airport to Stirling having given the service 3 months to settle and become somewhat established.

This particular journey was on the 0840 service on Wednesday 9th July 2025.

Flixbus services depart from Stance 10 at Glasgow Airport, however, this stop is located directly next to a smoking area, which can make the waiting experience rather unpleasant, so I would recommend waiting elsewhere until closer to departure.

This particular service appears to use a bus that comes straight from the McGill’s depot in Inchinnan and was at the airport 10 or so minutes before departure, with the driver being supported by a second member of staff who assisted with loading baggage.

On this particular service I was joined by 2 other passengers who were starting their journey here, and as a result we were all able to find our allocated seats within a matter of seconds.

This particular coach was equipped with USB-A charging facilities at each seat, and legroom was adequate for a journey of this length, but I know from experience it can get uncomfortable after a while.

After departing Glasgow Airport the service joins the motorway towards Glasgow City Centre, all services from the airport make a stop at Buchanan Bus Station, however, it is not possible to buy a ticket for this leg of the journey, for that you need First Bus 500 from Stance 1 (and a second mortgage to pay for it)!

More passengers joined the service at Buchanan Bus Station where the service waited for 10 minutes before departing at 0915. Unlike my previous Flixbus experiences, there were no announcements made by the driver to say what the next stop was, or when we were arriving at a stop.

The journey between Glasgow and Stirling isn’t going to make any lists of the most scenic routes in Scotland, but I was surprised at just how short it was, I always thought it would take a lot longer than it did, but I suppose the fast journey time is ruined slightly by the location of the coach stop used in Stirling.

The stop is located just over a mile from the city centre, and although the council does provide a shuttle service for £1, it runs once per hour, so if you miss it you either wait for it, take a taxi, or do what I did and walk (although it was a nice day and I had plenty of time so for me this was not an issue).

Three passengers exited here, including one of the passengers from the airport, and three more boarded. I should probably also mention here that if you have a Scottish Bus Pass (either for “Under 22”, “Over 60” or for a disability) you can use them on these services!

There is however, one problem with this service!

The current timetable which has been in place since the service started in April is a bit all over the place, with significant gaps in the service in both directions.

As can be seen from the slides above, there are two departures in the morning from Glasgow Airport, then nothing for 8 hours.

Lets use the day I was travelling as an example and I will try and explain what I mean.

For the 0740 departure there doesn’t appear to be a clear set of flights this service is aimed at. TUI had an arrival from Melbourne Orlando at 0610 which could conceivably connect with this service, especially as there is at 0840 service as a fall back.

The 0840 service does seem well timed for the Air Transat arrival at 0650 from Toronto, but you would either have to be very brave (or determined) to catch this bus if travelling on the Ryanair flight from Charleroi arriving at 0755.

Between the 0840 and 1640 service, flights from Dublin with Aer Lingus (a key flight for US arrivals via Dublin) arrive at 0805 and 1130, Lufthansa from Frankfurt arrives at 1220, Emirates from Dubai arrives at 1245 and Icelandair from Reykjavik arrives at 1325, yet all of these flights don’t have a natural connection onto this route, the latter 3 seems particularly like a missed opportunity as Aberdeen Airport does not have flights to these destinations.

It is the same going the other way, with no service to connect with TUI’s long haul departure to Cancun, Lufthansa to Frankfurt at lunchtime, Emirates to Dubai or Icelandair to Reykjavik.

When competing with Edinburgh for every available passenger, small things such as surface access play a key role in determining how a passenger will choose which airport to use, if one airport has a limited service and is up against another with a much more robust timetable it’s just another reason to fly from elsewhere.

There is actually a second issue with this service, although this one is not the fault of Flixbus.

Have you seen Glasgow Airport market this service anywhere? I certainly haven’t seen them promote it on social media…I guess you could call them a “numpty” for not doing so (if you know what I mean)!

The service was only just recently added to the airports website, although as you can see from the screenshot attached below, it’s not very helpful.

“Flix Bus from stance 10” is the only slight reference the airport has made to this service, no helpful summary of the route or the destination at least like there is for the other services, and the provided map doesn’t even feature it.

Plus, when you search for any Tweets (or whatever they’re called now) there are no results available.

Personally I feel promoting this service online is an easy win that would do nothing but benefit Glasgow Airport, and if it helps encourage more people to use the service it might just encourage Flix to add more services, thus improving the usability of the service.

My Final Thoughts

This is a service with lots of potential, great fares, friendly drivers and a very simple booking process that just feels like it’s let down by an inconsistent timetable.

To me, and I said this when the service was announced, it feels like it’s 80% of the way to being perfect, just more consistency to reach as many potential customers as possible.

It will be interesting to see what, if anything, Flix does to this service, and if they decide to add more services to Glasgow Airport, destinations such as Pitlochry, Inverness and Edinburgh could be popular if well timed and well marketed, but only time will tell.

How Much Did I Pay?

My fare was £6.99 booked 2 days before departure, with an additional £1 transaction fee and £1.49 for seat selection.