Britax Skyline Review

Britax Skyline

Britax retired the longtime favorite Parkway booster seat this spring and replaced it with the Highpoint, Midpoint and Skyline highback booster seats. Recently we reviewed the Highpoint, and we were happy to spend some time with the Skyline. Along with the Emblem and Allegiance convertible car seats, the Skyline is a member of Britax’s Essentials line of car seats.

Britax Skyline cupholders

The cupholders can be removed from the Skyline and thrown in the dishwasher! Big kids are messy too, so I was perhaps unreasonably pleased to find this feature. Removing the cup holder may also be useful for creating additional room in tight spaces.  There’s a tab underneath each cupholder and the cupholders themselves are labeled Left and Right, to the delight of our 6 year old model.

Removing these cupholders also helped us fit the Skyline next to a backless booster.

Britax Skyline lower anchor adjuster

The release for the lower anchors is a red button located on the left side of the booster. While the release button and lower anchor adjuster strap are easy to use, this placement can make uninstalling the Skyline from the opposite side of the car a bit of a challenge.  It may be more convenient to release the lower anchor on the side closest to you than to use this button.

Britax Skyline 6 years old

This model is 6 years old, weighs 63 pounds and is 53 inches tall. The lap belt fit perfectly on him in the Skyline: low on the hips, contacting the thighs. Better yet, he had no trouble whatsoever buckling himself into the Skyline in multiple cars.

Britax Skyline 8 Years Old

This sassy 8 year old is 51 inches tall and weighs 65 pounds.  She’s got room to grow in the Skyline and she finds it reasonably comfortable. She prefers a rather very padded booster seat and while the Skyline is comfortable enough, she’d prefer to ride in something with more padding on a regular basis.  The optional cupholders are always a crowd pleaser for her so she was glad to see that the Skyline has a place for her trinkets.

Britax Skyline 9 years old

Our 9 year old model is 59 inches tall and weighs just under 100 pounds. He has outgrown nearly all high back booster seats, but does prefer to have head support when he can.

In one of our review vehicles, he fit beautifully with the Skyline’s headrest fully extended. In terms of comfort, he found it vastly superior to his (not yet expired!) Britax Frontier 85 in booster mode.

In our other review car, however, the sloped roof of the vehicle prevented us from fully extending Sykline’s headrest.  In that vehicle, it was impossible to make the Skyline tall enough to accommodate him in any of the three back seat positions. So although the Skyline has very generous height and weight limits, your car’s geometry may not allow full extension of the booster.

With the cupholder removed, the Britax Skyline plays well with the Safety 1st Incognito

Installing three car seats and booster seats in the same row of a vehicle is always a challenge.  Though the Skyline is fairly wide at the top, the removable cupholders made it an option next to a safety 1st incognito. It wouldn’t be our first recommendation for tight spots but may work in some spaces.

Britax Skyline: not approved for airplane use

FAA label: Like all belt positioning booster seats, the Skyline is NOT approved for use on aircraft.  That’s because aircraft only have lap belts and booster seats require both the lap and shoulder portions of the vehicle seat belt.

Britax Skyline date of manufacture label

Date of Manufacture label: The Skyline expires 10 years after the date of manufacture.  This date and the date of expiration are on a label on the bottom of the seat.