Currently standing in terminal and the question arises, wouldn’t it make sense to load the back first? It seems inefficient to me waiting for everyone in the rows ahead to get seated when we could do it the other way around. I’m sure there’s a reason, but am genuinely curious. Thoughts?
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Airplane boarding efficiency has been studied, and TLDR: most of your perceived inefficiency is perception bias.
As long as boarding is a single file system with passengers taking between 0 and 15 seconds to sit down (aka stow carry-ons), that 0 to 15 second will hold up the entire line no matter what order they get on. Back to front? 15 seconds at the back will hold up the people at second to back just the same. Front to back? Every 15 second delay holds up the entire plane.
[Here’s a simple article](https://www.popularmechanics.com/science/a30549336/math-boarding-plane/) about the findings. Basically, unless you know who will take a long time and who will take a short time, random seating is the best option.
There is a fastest method, but it requires assigned seating and cooperative passengers with mildly complex instructions. [Here’s an article](https://www.wired.com/story/study-confirms-how-to-optimize-airplane-boarding/) that includes some info on it. Basically, it combines back-to-front boarding with alternating-sides with alternating-rows to effectively have an entire line on the plan and stowing at once, before letting the next line on. It’s sometimes known as the ‘Steffan method’ after the guy that published it (in 2011). It isn’t used because it’s complex (with 6 seats a row it requires splitting into 12 groups and then lining up in correct order).
Edit disclaimer: This analysis is mostly from reading the articles. My personal experience lately has been on a no-assigned-seat airline and 50%-70% capacity flights, which is just entirely different from most people complaining here. Different airlines and different planes and different passengers will have different effective results. But the “single line, carry-on over head” situation and “why don’t we try boarding a different way?” is a question that has been asked frequently enough and for long enough that Steffan wrote that big paper more than a decade ago.
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