Spirit Airlines Baggage Fees: What They Used to Cost

Spirit filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in November 2024, restructured its debt, then filed again in August 2025 as losses continued. In spring 2026, a jet-fuel price spike burned through its remaining cash while it was negotiating a roughly $500 million rescue package with the U.S. government. That financing fell through, and at about 3:00 a.m. Eastern on May 2, 2026, Spirit ceased all operations, requested an FAA ground stop, and began an orderly wind-down, telling customers not to go to the airport. The airline has since moved to liquidate under Chapter 7.

Credit and debit card purchases were refunded automatically after the shutdown; points and vouchers were not made whole, and bookings made through travel agencies had to be resolved through the agency. United, Delta, JetBlue, and Southwest capped fares for stranded Spirit passengers in the immediate aftermath. None of this can be undone by checking a fee schedule; it's included here only so the baggage numbers below are read with the right context.

Spirit never published one flat checked bag fee, and it operated the same dynamic pricing model that ultra-low-cost carriers like Frontier and Allegiant still use today. The price depended on your route, your travel dates, and when you paid: cheapest when added at initial booking, more expensive if added later online or at check-in, and most expensive if paid at the airport counter or the gate. Multiple secondary sources tracking Spirit's fees in its final year of operation put a standard first checked bag in the roughly $45 to $65 range depending on purchase timing, though Spirit itself never guaranteed a single number and its own fee calculator was the only authoritative source, which is no longer accessible.

The size and weight limits were more consistent across sources: a standard Spirit checked bag topped out at 50 lb and 62 total inches (length plus width plus height), with passengers able to check up to 5 bags per trip for a fee, since Spirit had no free checked bag allowance on any standard fare. Overweight bags (roughly 51 to 100 lb) and oversized bags (roughly 63 to 80 inches) each carried their own additional flat surcharge on top of the base bag fee.

Because Spirit's official fee pages are no longer live to verify against, treat any specific historical dollar figure, including the ranges above, as approximate rather than exact. The size and weight ceilings are more reliably corroborated than the exact fee amounts.

These two numbers are well corroborated, including from Spirit's own archived support pages. Spirit's free personal item was 18 x 14 x 8 inches (45 x 35 x 20 cm) and had to fit entirely under the seat in front of you; the sizer at the gate was enforced strictly. This is the size that made "the Spirit personal item" a well-known phrase among budget travelers, since it was the one bag guaranteed free on every fare.

The carry-on bag, by contrast, was never free on Spirit. It measured 22 x 18 x 10 inches including handles and wheels, wider and deeper than the roughly 22 x 14 x 9 inch carry-on most full-service airlines use, but Spirit charged for it on every fare including the base ticket. Because of that fee, most budget-conscious Spirit flyers packed to the free personal item instead of paying for the larger carry-on at all.

Frontier and Allegiant are the closest replacements for Spirit's old ultra-low-cost model, and both use the identical 18 x 14 x 8 inch free personal item Spirit did, so a bag that was Spirit-legal still fits under their seats without repacking. Avelo and Southwest also cover a meaningful share of former Spirit routes, though their bag rules differ in the details.

Frontier's free personal item matches Spirit's exactly, but Frontier's carry-on (24 x 16 x 10 inches, 35 lb) is free only on its Economy bundle or higher, not on its cheapest Basic fare, mirroring Spirit's old add-on-carry-on pattern. Allegiant's personal item is also 18 x 14 x 8 inches and free on every fare, with its carry-on (22 x 16 x 10 inches) priced dynamically the same way Spirit's was, from roughly $10 to $75 depending on when you buy it. Avelo's personal item runs slightly larger at 17 x 13 x 9 inches and is free on every fare, with its carry-on priced from $35 to $70 per the airline's own optional-services page. Southwest still includes a full free carry-on (24 x 16 x 10 inches) and free personal item on every fare, which makes it the most generous of the four on cabin baggage, even though Southwest ended its free checked bag policy in May 2025 and now charges $45 for a first checked bag.

Before you book any of these, run your actual bag through the free fit checker on this site. It's faster than cross-referencing four different airlines' size charts by hand, and it tells you immediately whether your old Spirit-legal personal item or carry-on clears the airline you're switching to.