The holiday season is here, and many people are set flocking to the airport, Eurostar or ferry to head off on their summer travels. One of the most stressful parts of travelling (other than remembering your passport) is packing.
When it comes to packing for your holiday, you have to consider many things, like trying not to forget anything, sticking to the 100ml liquid container rule and making sure your luggage isn’t too heavy. With countless outfits to wear, plenty of toiletries to bring and stacks of books to get through, how exactly do you pack everything?!
Whether you’re using the best suitcase or the best carry-on luggage for your next trip, you can save space, avoid breaks and stay organised with the following 8 packing hacks.
1. Roll your clothes
The most popular packing hack to make sure all your outfits fit into your suitcase is to roll your clothes. Rolling your clothes saves more space than folding and if done correctly, it can prevent wrinkles and creases. It’s a great hack to try with any type of clothing, especially dresses and T-shirts, and once you have a collection of petite oblong-shaped rolls, you can easily lay them in your suitcase and marvel at the amount of room you still have.
2. Use packing cubes
Packing cubes or organiser bags are a must-have for travelling, especially if you’re going away for longer than a week. Just like rolling your clothes, packing cubes save a huge amount of space as they compress everything, and they can fit into almost any size suitcase or hand luggage. Packing cubes are also a handy way to stay organised, as you can pack multiple outfits at a time or use a cube for each item of clothing. They’re also pretty inexpensive, for example, this 11 piece packing cube set is only £19.99 at Amazon.
3. Fill shoes with underwear
Yet another space saving trick, try stuffing your shoes with your underwear and socks. This hack helps conserve room in your luggage, prevents your shoes from being crushed in transit and helps keep their shape. Once you’ve put your undies in your shoes (this hack will also work with hats and bags), pop your shoes into a dust bag to make sure any dirt on the bottom of them doesn’t get all over your clothes.
4. Stuff your neck pillow with extra clothes
@cheapholidayexpert ♬ Soulful Strut - The Fame Gang
If you’ve only got hand luggage or the best backpack to travel with, a sneaky trick to extending it is to fill your neck pillow. Yes, you read that right. Most neck pillows have a zip which you can undo and remove the foam from. Once you’ve done that, you can fill the empty neck pillow sleeve with any extra clothes you might have, like underwear, socks, leggings, hats and T-shirts.
5. Soak cotton balls in perfume
Packing perfume is always tricky, mainly due to the plane's liquid allowance and the bottle potentially leaking during your flight. To avoid this, try soaking individual cotton balls with your perfume and seal them in an airtight bag. When you want to freshen up, simply take a cotton ball and dab it on yourself. This is an effective way to retain your fragrance and takes up hardly any room in your bag. See how to pack perfume for more tips.
6. Pack solid toiletries instead of liquids
For those who are always caught out by the 100ml liquid rule, swap to solid toiletries instead. At most stores, you can buy bars of shampoo, conditioner, shower gel and body wash which are small, weigh less than liquid options and most importantly, they won’t leak all over your things. As solid toiletries are more compact than liquids, they also don’t take up much space and they can fit into any bag you have.
7. Wear jewellery on the flight
Depending on how long you’re on holiday for or how much jewellery you’re bringing with you, save yourself from any tangling issues by wearing your jewellery on the flight. Most small fine jewellery can go through airport security without you having to take it off, and you don’t have to worry about taking an extra bag with you to look after your accessories.
8. Put an AirTag in your luggage
Everyone’s worst nightmare is losing their luggage and oftentimes when this happens, you spend ages in the airport trying to track it down. Instead, keep track of your belongings with an AirTag. While this is unlikely to speed up the process of getting your things back, it can give you some peace of mind and saves you time if you need to file a travel insurance claim.
For more packing tips, check out the best packing tricks from TikTok.
