Airport Lounge, Helmut Schmidt Airport, Hamburg, Germany 🇩🇪

Hamburg Airport Lounge at Helmut Schmidt Airport offers impressive views of the apron and a relaxed atmosphere with a large selection of spirits. Is it a recommendable option for travelers who want to spend a comfortable time waiting at the airport, despite minor shortcomings in terms of food and showers? Read for yourself.

Location

Airport Lounge is located on the airside of Helmut Schmidt Airport Hamburg. The easiest way to get to the airport coming from the city is to take the S-Bahn directly to the underground terminal. Of course, you can also arrive by car. For car sharing services, there is an assigned and separate parking area past all the car queues which is very convenient. However, you should know that there is an extra upcharge for parking these cars at the airport.

For all those who only want to drop off or pick up someone on a short time basis, there is of course also a (usually rather chaotic) kiss&fly lane.

How to get to the Lounge

You can already see the Airport Lounge right behind the central security checkpoint at the top of the central terminal. It sits at the very top of the hall. You have to walk through the middle passageway towards the gates anyway. At the end, right where you have already arrived at the gates, you have to make a U-turn and take the escalator up in the direction of Lounges & Restaurants. You will find the food court on the second floor and the lounges on the third. Of course, there is also an elevator that can be used.

The Airport Lounge shares the upper area with the Emirates Lounge. But more on that below.

In addition to these two lounges, Lufthansa also has a Business and a Senator Lounge at Hamburg Airport. Personally, I don’t like the Business Lounge that much. But as the Senator Lounge is really great I will be writing a review about it shortly.

Check-in

Upon reaching the top floor, you will find the entrance to the Airport Lounge on your right. The Emirates Lounge is located on the left. Your access authorizations will be checked at a service desk.

Access authorization

Various airlines and lounge memberships entitle you to use the Airport Lounge. I received a free Priority Pass via the American Express Platinum card as part of the overall benefits package and also used this for access to the lounge.

You can as well simply buy access. This currently costs €45 per person. Children between 3 and 12 pay €15, infants are free. But please note: you can only pay by card. Cash payment is not possible.

The access authorization allows you to use the Airport Lounge for a maximum of 3 hours. However, what happens if you exceed this time and who is supposed to keep track of it is not clear to me.

Lounge overview

The Airport Lounge occupies the entire gallery and therefore has a fantastic window front with a gigantic view of the apron. To the right and left of the staircase are large open areas with a wide variety of seating options. These include high tables, various types of armchairs and long tables. The color scheme ranges from black to brown.

Most of the monitors show a continuous loop of commercials from the lounge and advertising partners. Separate monitors are now used to display flights.

Opening hours

At the time of publication of this review, the Airport Lounge is open every day of the week from 5:15 to 21:00.

At the back of the airport lounge is a somewhat separate area, which is actually the Emirates Lounge. I assume that when this is open, this part is separated off and then has its own entry control. As far as I know, the lounge opens a few hours before the two Emirates flights of the day.

View

The view is the real highlight of the airport lounge! The huge window front with a view of the apron is great. But every good thing usually also has a downside. You have a unique view of what’s happening at the airport, but because the sunlight would be by far too strong and heat up the whole place, the windows are fitted with slightly shading blinds. Unfortunately, this prevents a clear view outside.

Nevertheless. I love the view outside and the brightness, openness and spaciousness of the lounge.

On the opposite side of the window front, you can see into the part of the terminal where security checks are carried out and part of the duty-free store is located. It’s a great location for people-watching.

Lounge equipment

WiFi

WiFi can of course be used free of charge. All you have to do is enter an e-mail address when you register – it doesn’t matter which one 😉 The loading speed was fine for me. Many of the guests also streamed movies and / or series without any problems.

Newspapers & Magazines

Unfortunately, there are no newspapers available in the lounge which I thought to be a shame. But there was a relatively wide selection of magazines (again, probably advertising partners) available.

Showers

The Airport Lounge also offers its guests two shower rooms. To be able to use these, you must borrow the key from reception in return for a deposit. However, as the colleague there is usually (obviously) alone, this can take a while.

I think the opportunity to shower is great and I usually use it whenever possible. But I would like to share my little story about this shower experience with you. Surely you’ll have a laugh with me!

I was given the key for shower no. 2. Once I wanted to unlock the room, it was immediately locked again from the inside and it was verbally made very clear to me from the inside that it was occupied. So I go back to reception and get a quite confused look and various queries from the employee there. Yes. I tried to unlock no. 2. And yes. I’m sure I didn’t get the number wrong. And yes. There was definitely someone in that room!

The employee asks for a moment’s patience and then accompanies me to the shower room. Once there, he also tries to unlock the room and gets exactly the same reaction as me. It is immediately locked again and he is verbally informed that the room is occupied.

The employee is just as confused as I am. A short moment later, the door opens and another airport employee comes out of the room. He has obviously taken the opportunity to use the restroom in peace.

Confused faces on all sides. A quick “Ah!” and “Oh!” and “Interesting!” and I’m assigned room no. 1. Okay.

That raises a few questions for me… How could the airport employee get into this locked room? And why is he using this toilet? And why does the key for no. 2 also work for no. 1? Incidentally, the doors could only be locked from the inside with the key. Which means that if someone gets confused with the numbers, they can simply unlock the locked, occupied room.

Well. To be honest, I had a rather uncomfortable shower afterwards and was showering in quite a rush to get back out quickly!

In general, I have to say that the facilities have no inviting feel whatsoever. More like a shower in a sports hall. Sure – that’s complaining on a high level. But honestly! If I had paid €45 for entry. I would have been madly annoyed.

There was a small and a large towel and a bath mat prepared inside the room. Unfortunately, there was no shampoo, conditioner or body wash apart from a hand soap at the washbasin. Not to mention body lotion. To be honest, I was really disappointed. When you consider that it is no longer possible to take your own care products with you after the security check, unless you explicitly buy smaller containers for this purpose, I find this situation difficult.

In the end, however, I don’t want to dramatize it all. At least I was refreshed and was able to get over the situation quite well with a few shakes of the head and a smile over another glass of white wine.

Smoking room

There is a separate smoking room in the toilet block with a view of the inner courtyard.

Kid’s corner

Unfortunately, there is no separate area for children and families.

Special features

Some of the tables have built-in charging options, including inductive charging. That’s very cool!

Catering

Buffet

On the homepage, the catering is praised in the highest terms with beautiful pictures. A breakfast buffet is offered until 11:00. After that, a slightly different buffet including “warm” dishes will be presented.

Unfortunately, I have to say that, as is often the case in such situations, the advertising cannot keep up with reality. The buffet offer is rather mediocre and the hot food on offer consisted of Viennese sausages. I could choose from potato or pasta salad as sides. There were also a few cold cuts, waffles and some sweets. Quite tasty, but pretty basic.

Bar

I was able to get cold drinks myself from the fridge and the bar. The coffee machine for hot drinks was unfortunately broken. On a positive note, there were a lot of spirits and a wide range of beers on offer in our own fridge – Flensburger seemed to be an advertising partner and was also widely represented.

Conclusion

I like the lounge. The nice big room with the great views of the tarmac and the security checkpoint is great. Unfortunately, the food on offer is pretty mediocre, but the selection of spirits is relatively large. The showers have more the character of a sports club – but at least they exist. In my opinion, at this lounge it depends even more on what you value compared to others .

Personally, I can recommend the Hamburg Airport Lounge for all types of travelers. Only families with children who would like to have a play corner might have a hard time here.

Lounge Homepage

Hamburg Airport Lounge

Rating

We award the Hamburg Airport Lounge 7 out of 10 possible points.

We deduct one point for the not so great cleanliness of the tables and floors. More attention should really be paid to this. Another point is deducted for the very sad buffet and a final point is deducted for the shower situation. Basically, it’s great to have a shower at all, but the facilities and then the key situation. I found that difficult as it wasn’t possible to take a proper shower.

Go there?

I´d say so. Personally, I prefer the Airport Lounge to the Lufthansa Business Lounge in Hamburg. But when it comes to the Lufthansa Senator Lounge, I can definitely argue on that.

YouTube Review

Unfortunately, we don’t have a YouTube review for this lounge. However, if you are interested in lounges, take a look at our video of the Turkish Airlines Istanbul Lounge.