Stuttgart Airport Terminal 4

Terminal 4 handles holiday charter traffic and takes arrivals as well as departures. Arrivals are on level 2, in line with the rest of the airport.

It is the one terminal at Stuttgart that is not under the main roof. Terminals 1, 2 and 3 share a single structure; Terminal 4 stands slightly apart and is connected by a walkway. That is a short distance and a well-signposted one, but it is enough to make Terminal 4 the terminal most often missed on a first visit — and, more to the point, the one most often forgotten by whoever is coming to collect you.

What arrives here is charter: families, groups, and the luggage that goes with a fortnight rather than a meeting. Four people with four large cases is not a taxi-rank problem, it is a vehicle-size problem, and it is worth settling before you land rather than at the kerb.

Your driver waits inside Terminal 4 arrivals with a name sign, and the vehicle class was chosen against the number of passengers and bags you gave at booking — which at a charter terminal is the part that actually determines whether the journey works.

Eight free minutes at the kerb is fine for a saloon and two cabin bags. It is not fine for a family unloading a fortnight’s luggage, which is another reason the meeting happens inside and the loading happens without a clock on it.

Terminal 4 is a walkway away from the other three rather than a separate site, so a mix-up costs a few minutes on foot along one road, or a free shuttle every ten to fifteen minutes. The more common error at Stuttgart is not Terminal 4 — it is arranging to be met at Terminal 2, which takes no arrivals at all.