Five Tips for Traveling with Your Infant

Written by Kendra Victor, CPST

Visiting family during the holidays can be a lot of fun. It can also be overwhelming to manage when thinking about the safety of your new baby. Do you let people kiss the baby? Is Grandma’s house baby proofed enough for you toddler? How do you travel long distance with an infant? In this post, we have consolidated five infant travel safety tips so you can cross at least one thing off of your holiday list.

1. Use the proper seat

It is important to have the appropriate seat for your infant. Children under four years old are safest in a rear facing car seat in any back seat you can get a proper installation in. It is okay to use either an infant bucket seat or a convertible seat for your infant. You should choose whatever style is more useful for your family. Some people prefer to use a bucket seat for travel because it is lightweight and safe to install without the added base. Others prefer to use a convertible seat for the convenience of using the same seat for several years as their baby grows.

2. Use your seat safely

Once you know what seat you are going to use, you need to know how to properly use it. Always check the specifics of your particular seat and your particular car, but here are some basic guidelines you can follow to ensure that your baby is as safe as possible:

• Install the seat with the LATCH system OR with the seatbelt. Even though it may seem more secure to use both, it is not safe to use both at once because it can put improper strain on the seat in the wrong places.

• Ensure that your seat is level. Some seats have a bubble indicator or a green symbol to use as a guideline, others may have a line that needs to be parallel with the ground (this is more common on infant seats without a base).

• Your seat should be tightened to the point that it does not move more than 1” side to side or up and down along the belt path. It is normal for the back of your seat to move more than the 1”.

• The seat should not be braced on the front adult seat. 

Now it is time to put your baby in the seat:

• Make sure that none of the straps are twisted.

• Tighten the straps enough so that you can not pinch the webbing at the shoulder. Don’t forget to pull the extra slack out of the hip area!

• The chest clip should be at armpit level to ensure that the straps stay where they should.

• Straps should come from at or below the shoulders for all rear-facing passengers.

• Don’t forget that nothing like blankets or puffy jackets should be between the baby and the straps!

  3. Take regular travel breaks

Infants should get regular breaks from being in their car seats. Similar to how adults need to stretch and use the restroom, infants do too! This is a good time to feed your baby, change their diaper, and attend to any other care tasks they may need. Taking a break every two hours protects their spine and airway from strain.

4. Traveling by Air

While most airlines allow you to travel with your infant as a “lap child,” safety experts recommend having a car seat installed on an airplane as well. When you board the plane, ask the flight attendant for a seat belt extender to make installation easier for you. Infants still need to be rear facing on the airplane and it is required to install on a window seat in case of evacuation or emergency. Make sure your seat has an FAA sticker to prove that it has passed flying safety inspections with the Federal Aviation Administration. The flight attendants will ask to see it! 

If purchasing a seat on the airplane for your infant is not possible for you, you can check your car seat at the gate or mail a travel car seat to your destination ahead of time. Car seats provided by rental car companies are not considered safe to use because it is impossible to know the history of the seat.

5. Visit a Child Passenger Safety Technicians (CPST) before you go

Now that you have the basics, you are ready to travel with your baby to visit your loved ones this holiday season. It is always a good idea to have your seat checked by a Certified Passenger Safety Technician before your travels. There are many free car seat check opportunities in your community. Visit safekids.org to find a car seat tech near you.

Kendra Victor is a Car Seat Expert and Postpartum Doula with Sanctuary Doulas + Family Care in Boulder, Colorado. In addition to doula care, she’s also an educator who teaches childbirth education, infant CPR and safety, breastfeeding, and more. Learn more about her here!