A few days ago, I flew from London to Seville on one of Ryanair's new planes. One great innovation for tall travellers is that the seats don't recline - so that there is no chance of having your patellae crushed by the person in front. However, the seat pitch is not great, so I was still uncomfortable in the standard seats. However, the two rows of central emergency exit seats have masses of room, and were ideal - so we shifted into them as soon as we spotted a couple of empty ones.
The problem with low-cost airlines is that there is no seat allocation, and therefore no chance of pre-booking the emergency exit seats. However, they do now have a policy of giving you a number at check-in, and then boarding the plane in two groups (e.g numbers under 51 first). So you need to arrive early to get into the first group. If the plane is boarding by both front and rear doors, aim for the rear one. The first group of people will be going up the front steps for seats near the front, and probably will have blocked the gangways, preventing people from reaching the middle of the plane.
If you have a small child with you, you can often board first, but of course the children can't sit in the emergency exit seats. If your partner is with you, they can sit in the row behind (or in front). OK, you won't be sitting beside them, but that's a small price to pay for comfort!
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