BubbleBum Inflatable Travel Booster Seat for Car, Portable Booster Seat for Car - Backless, Foldable & Narrow Slim Fit -Travel Car Seat for Kids 40-100 lbs - Black

We needed something safe and portable for a trip to Europe with our 3.5 year old. Hes huge for his age (42 inches, and 42 lbs.) so he qualifies to use the bubble bum even though he is not 4 years old. It rolls up very compactly and comes with a small drawstring bag for storage. I brought it in my carryon backpack for the flight, and have been carrying a larger purse on excursions so we can bring it around with us. It is so easy and quick to inflate! I bring it out when my husband hails a taxi and in 45 seconds (4 or 5 puffs) its blown up and ready to go! It doesnt take long to slip the seatbelt through all 3 positioning clips, and my son loves sitting on it. Once the cab ride is done its easy to deflate and I roll it up to put back in my purse. I originally bought the Mifold for the trip, but returned it after I realized it was not rated by the IIHS. The bubble bum has been great and I love that the case is included in the price (with the Mifold it was not). As a random side note this also doubled as a pillow on the flight since its reasonably soft with the cover on it. I cant speak to durability as weve only had it for 2 weeks, but I plan to use this for domestic travel now as well vs lugging the high back booster around.

easy to use and very useful for travel

Me and all my friends use this for traveling! It’s been awesome and works great! Stays blown up for the Uber and deflates easy to be compact! Great purchase!

I bought this for my 8 year old while we traveled out of town. It is compact and light weight enough that he carried it in his backpack, inflated in less than a minute, and was easy enough that he could install it on his own (after supervised practice)! The shoulder strap was perfect for bringing the seatbelt to a good spot on his shoulder as well. My son said that it was very comfortable to sit on and it was even tiny enough that we could sit 3 people across (him and two adults) in the back seat of a midsized car. I love that I now have a backup car seat if a friend comes to the house to play or if my son is traveling with someone else. Highly recommend - a great buy!

It was very easy to transport and then to inflate and literally use. Not only that it took up way less space then our other car seat booster especially in smaller backseats and very comfortable according to my little one who had to sit on it.

We needed a narrow booster seat to fit three across in our car. We use this for our eldest, who at 10 is about to graduate from boosters altogether. He began using it at about age 7. We dont need height from a booster for him, just the shoulder belt positioner. The seat belts in our backseat are really high, so he still needs that feature for now. I recommend this seat for older, bigger, mature kids who dont need seat height or a reminder to sit right, just a better fit to the lap and/or shoulder seat belts. Its also great for difficult three-across installations, travel, and carpools. I think they may have fixed this since we bought ours, but we do find the lap belt guides tricky to thread. It took awhile before my son could do that part himself. I also find the expiration date of four years to be on the low end for car seats. Then again, for the price, you get a lot of use out of it. Its a very handy seat for travel, as weve recently found. You deflate it and toss it into whatever bag is handy — easy peasy. Blow it back up at your destination, and youre good to go. The only downside is how mucky the back of a seat gets in the car, and then you have to put your mouth on it, ha ha. This seat would also work well for carpool kids and ride-share travel and friends visiting and the like, assuming the users fit the size requirements. (With the 40-pound minimum, my skinny middle child at nearly 7 can still not use this seat.) Comfort-wise, my son complained at the downgrade in comfort level from his previous Britax front-facing car seat. However, he stopped complaining after a few days, and hes been fine with the BubbleBum ever since. It doesnt have bells and whistles, such as arm rests or cupholders, which is what helps keep it narrow and easy to fit into a small space. My sons on the larger end of the percentile calculators for height and weight, and he does fine with it. I think his thighs spill over the sides a bit, but he doesnt seem to mind that. Its basically like sitting on a regular seat in the car with a tiny bit of air cushion. So its not plush, but theyll be fine once they get used to it. My sons not prone to peer pressure around this issue, but Ill point out that its a nice option for older kids who dont want an obvious booster but still need that belt positioning help. All in all, the BubbleBum has worked nicely for us, and wed get another one if our younger kid ever gets above 40 pounds!

While the concept is lovely for travel, the seat didn’t stay in place. It slid out from underneath my kids butts and proved useless on the first ride in our rental car. We drove straight to a big box store and bought replacement seats with a base that doesn’t slide. Even with the strap in the clips on the sides and the back strap for the shoulder strap, it just gets tangled once the kids started to slide. Just as a note for future buyers: This might be my own poor understanding of the product description and photos, but I had thought the inflatable portion was optional and there was still some structure to the seat. I would have not purchased the seat had I known it doesn’t have any structure aside from the air you put in it.

This is an awesome addition to our travel gear. We were agonizing how we would travel safely with two little kids; we anticipate to regularly be taking taxi cabs without having a reasonable option of lugging two car seats around with us. While a full car seat is obviously preferable, the Bubble Bum is the next best thing. And it collapses small enough that I can fit two of them into a backpack with still some space to spare. N.b. even when collapsed, it isnt exactly tiny. This is thanks to the use of nicer and thicker materials; so, I cant really complain. But I am just glad I was already planning on taking a backpack with me. I wouldnt want to hold the booster in my hand for a lengthy amount of time while sightseeing about town. Even with the nice included bag, doing so would get old pretty soon. One positive surprise was my discovery that the Bubble Bum comes with an included (rudimentary) seat belt adjuster. Depending on the type of car and the size of the kid, this feature can come in quite handy. For some reason, I hadnt noticed that it was included, when I ordered the booster, and I therefore also got a BRICA seat belt adjuster. For the larger kid, I probably wont be needing the BRICA. But for the smaller kid, the BRICA adjuster provides extra comfort and ensures that the seat belt runs in the right place. The Bubble Bums seat belt adjuster sits on top of the shoulder, whereas the BRICA adjuster clips to the belt in front of the child. The two products can be combined, if so desired. Overall, the Bubble Bum is easy and fast to inflate and pretty straight-forward to install. It still takes a moment to get settled in, and I hope we wont run into too many impatient cab drivers. But even with two kids I dont expect I will need more than about a minute to get both of them buckled in -- assuming the cab even has proper seat belts on the back seats. A lap belt isnt compatible with this (or pretty much any other) booster. And unfortunately, where we are going, seat belts on back seats arent necessarily a standard feature.

UPDATE (4-STAR REVIEW): With a vacation and a rental car planned, we needed a portable booster seat, so this time I ordered two other different travel-friendly booster seats from Amazon. We required that a travel booster seat be lightweight, take up little space in our luggage, be accepted by our daughter (now age 8), and most-importantly, safe. The other two booster seats arrived and unearthed the previously dreaded BubbleBum, and let her have her choice by sitting on each in our car at home. Given the three choices, she chose the BubbleBum. We used it in the rental car during our Spring Break 2017 vacation, and she used it, no problem. So, Ive updated my review from 2-stars to 4-stars to reflect our success. My daughter would probably still prefer the seat have more of a tapered edge on the front (under her legs), so she didnt feel like she was sitting on a bubble (no pun intended), but it worked sufficiently for its purpose. I did have to check on her to make sure she was sitting upright and to the back of the seat, or else her safety would be compromised, and she needed help getting buckled-in each time, but that just took 3-minutes. Its not perhaps the most ideal item, but when traveling, you sometimes have to make due, and thats what this is. I would not recommend this for longterm use, and neither does the manufacturer. I would recommend this for short-term use while traveling. PREVIOUS, 2-STAR REVIEW: This is a great idea, and I really wanted it to be a success for my family, but it didnt work for my 7-y.o. The seat is too small to comfortably sit on for any length of time, and is much like trying to sit on a balloon. My daughter is not a big child and is actually on the petite side and it doesnt give sufficient seating area for comfort. It would be better if it was made big enough to cover a car seat more, because when inflated it was only about 12x14, or so. Additionally, she found a way to flip it up behind her and not sit on it, and Id be driving down the freeway and glance over my shoulder to find her in an unsafe position on the seat of the car, rather than the inflatable booster seat; not good. Also, without arm rests, I kept finding my daughter sitting on it in creative ways, such as turned sideways or with it up behind her back. In short, she hated it.

As a parent of three kids (5, 3 and 18 months) Im faced with the oh-too-familiar problem of finding a way to fit three child car seats in the back of my vehicle. I have a mid-sized SUV with one row of back seats and - with my 5-year-old about to graduate into a booster - I knew fitting three seats side-by-side would be an issue. I was initially skeptical about the BubbleBum because it seems such a small, inconsequential and inadequate proposition. But Im pleasantly surprised to report that my expectations were completely unfounded. First off the size and portability is unbeatable. I was concerned that it would be too awkward to function as a booster seat for long-journeys, but my five-year-old is completely comfortable sitting on it. It sits - with ample room to spare - between two other childs car seats and there is plenty of space. Buckling in and out is easy. Just guide the regular lap-belt portion of your cars standard seatbelts through the two red guide clips, and youre done. This literally takes seconds to do and is far less complicated than I feared from reading some of the descriptions online. Set-up was also super-easy. Just blow-it up like a balloon, insert the air-stopping valve and youre done. The added bonus is that the BubbleBum also serves as a portable option - so if your child is traveling in a different car.....or if you need something for a taxi or a rental car.....its extremely portable.