Your journey · Baggage
Baggage rules
Two different sets of rules apply to your bags, and confusing them is the usual reason someone is repacking on the terminal floor. Your allowance — how many bags, how heavy, what fits in the cabin — comes from your airline. What the airport will physically accept at the check-in belt is set here.
Maximum accepted per item
Who decides what
Two rulebooks, one belt
Read your airline's rules first; they decide what your ticket entitles you to. Then read the airport's, because a compliant allowance can still be refused if the bag itself is not acceptable.
Your airline sets
- How many bags you may check, and how heavy each may be
- Cabin bag size, weight and how many pieces
- Excess baggage charges and pre-paid extra allowance
- Sports equipment, musical instruments and oversize acceptance
- Whether a pushchair or wheelchair goes to the aircraft door
- Unaccompanied minor arrangements
- Claims for delayed, damaged or missing baggage
The airport sets
- The shape and condition a bag must be in to go on the belt
- Maximum single-item dimensions accepted at check-in
- How bags may and may not be secured
- Whether items may be taped or wrapped together
- Access to the baggage wrapping centre and approved boxes
For guidance only: Air Arabia, which operates most scheduled flights from RKT, publishes a 10 kg cabin allowance at 55 × 40 × 20 cm and checked options of 20, 30 and 40 kg. Every other airline differs. Check the allowance printed on your own booking.
Airport acceptance rules
What will and will not go on the belt
These are the airport's own rules, in force since 1 March 2019. They exist because baggage handling systems jam on odd shapes and loose straps, and a jam delays everybody's flight. The airport reserves the right to refuse a bag that does not comply.
- 01
Every bag needs one flat surface
A bag with no flat side cannot sit on the belt or in a container. If yours has none, it has to be repacked before it can be accepted. - 02
Odd shapes go into an approved box
Boxes are available at the baggage wrapping centre in the terminal for a nominal charge. Repacking into an approved box is the normal fix for anything that will not sit flat. - 03
Rope and string are not accepted
Baggage secured with rope or string will be refused at check-in — it catches in the machinery. Use strong tape instead. - 04
Two items taped together count as neither
Two bags taped or wrapped into one will not be accepted at check-in. Present them separately, within your allowance. - 05
Maximum dimensions
90 cm long by 75 cm high by 60 cm wide, per item. Anything larger will not be accepted, whatever your airline allowance says. - 06
Excess must be repacked
Baggage over your allowance has to be repacked to comply, and the airline's excess charges apply on top.
Packing
Eight things worth doing before you close the case
Small habits, all of which prevent a specific problem at either end of the flight.
- Pack anything you will want on board into your hand luggage, not the hold.
- Keep your passport with you. Never put it in a bag you are checking.
- Keep laptops and tablets where you can reach them — they go in a separate security tray.
- Remove every old baggage tag. Stale tags are how bags end up in the wrong city.
- Take extra care with anything fragile, and consider carrying it instead.
- Remove or tuck away loose straps and handles so nothing catches on the belt.
- Know your bag's colour and brand well enough to describe it to someone else.
- Keep your claim tags until you and your bag are both home.
Restricted items
What cannot travel, and where
Dangerous goods rules are international and are applied by your airline, which publishes the authoritative list for your flight. The two directions catch people out in opposite ways.
Cabin only — never in the hold
- Spare lithium batteries of any kind, terminals taped or in their original packaging
- Power banks and portable chargers
- Electronic cigarettes and vaping devices, which may not be charged or used on board
Hold only — not in the cabin
- Sharp items: knives, scissors above the permitted blade length, tools, blades of any kind
- Sporting goods that could be used as a weapon: bats, clubs, cues, poles
- Flammable liquids and gases, and anything pressurised beyond a permitted toiletry
Above the standard watt-hour limits, a battery needs your airline's approval, and above the upper limit it cannot travel at all. Mobility scooters and powered wheelchairs have their own rules — tell your airline the battery type when you book.
Sports equipment and oversize items
Bicycles, golf bags, diving gear, surfboards and instruments have to be declared to your airline in advance; most charge separately and some limit how many go on a flight. Whatever your airline agrees, the item still has to meet the airport's 90 × 75 × 60 cm limit at check-in or be repacked into an approved box at the wrapping centre.
When something goes wrong
Delayed, damaged and missing bags
One rule matters more than the rest: report it before you leave the baggage hall. A claim opened at the belt is straightforward; one opened the next day is not.
- 01
Report it before you leave the hall
Find your airline's handling agent in the baggage reclaim area and open a report there and then. Keep the reference they give you. - 02
Keep your claim tags and your boarding pass
The tag stub is the proof that links you to the bag. Photograph it, along with any damage, before you hand anything over. - 03
The claim sits with the airline
Compensation, delivery of a delayed bag and repair or replacement of a damaged one are the carrier's responsibility under its conditions of carriage, not the airport's. - 04
The airport can help trace a bag on the field
For baggage lost or found at RKT itself, contact the Duty Officer at the Departure Terminal. They hold the airport's Lost and Found.
Lost property
Something left behind in the terminal
The airport keeps a Lost and Found store. Anything handed in — in either terminal, at security, in the café — goes there, and the Duty Officer at the Departure Terminal is the person to call. Be ready to describe the item in enough detail to identify it, and to prove it is yours.
- Duty Officer
- +971 50 487 2704
- info@rakairport.com
The store's opening hours, how long items are held and what proof of ownership is required are not yet published. We are asking for them and they will appear here.
Talk to someone
If something is not covered here
The Duty Officer is on the field around the clock and is the right first call on the day of travel. Anything about your ticket, your allowance or your seat belongs with your airline.
Ask your airline first
Fares, allowances, seat selection, name changes, delays, cancellations, missing bags and special assistance requests are all handled by the airline that issued your ticket. The airport cannot change them.
Times and allowances on this page are published for planning. Rules set by airlines, UAE Customs and the immigration authorities change without notice — confirm the detail that matters to your trip before you travel.