Yes, going through airport security while pregnant is safe. The screening equipment used at airport checkpoints, including metal detectors, full-body scanners, and carry-on bag X-ray machines, poses no known risk to a pregnant person or a developing baby. This is true at every stage of pregnancy.
What Airport Scanners Actually Do
U.S. airports primarily use two types of screening devices for passengers: walk-through metal detectors and millimeter wave scanners (the booths where you stand with your arms raised). Understanding how each one works makes it easier to see why neither is a concern during pregnancy.
Walk-through metal detectors use a low-level magnetic field to detect metallic objects. They do not produce ionizing radiation at all, and they are not known to pose any health risk to anyone, pregnant or otherwise.
Millimeter wave scanners use non-ionizing radio waves, the same broad category of energy that includes your cell phone signal. According to the CDC, these machines release thousands of times less energy than a cell phone. They don’t use X-rays, and they don’t add to your body’s ionizing radiation exposure. The radio waves bounce off your skin to create an outline of your body’s surface. They don’t penetrate into your organs or reach a fetus.
What About X-Ray Machines?
The X-ray machines at security are the tunnel-shaped devices your carry-on bags pass through on a conveyor belt. These do use ionizing radiation, but they are heavily shielded so that essentially no radiation escapes the cabinet while your bags are being scanned. Standing next to the machine as your luggage goes through is not a risk.
You may have heard of backscatter X-ray scanners, which were once used to scan passengers directly. These machines used extremely low-energy X-rays that couldn’t penetrate past the skin. Even when they were in use, the maximum dose a person could receive from a single scan was about 0.1 microsieverts. For perspective, the average person absorbs roughly 3,600 microsieverts per year just from natural background radiation (the sun, the ground, trace elements in food). A single backscatter scan was roughly 36,000 times smaller than that annual dose. These machines have largely been phased out of U.S. airports in favor of millimeter wave technology, which uses no X-rays at all.
Is the Flight Itself a Bigger Factor?
Ironically, the security checkpoint is the least radiation-relevant part of air travel. Once you’re at cruising altitude, you’re exposed to higher levels of cosmic radiation than you receive on the ground. A single cross-country flight exposes you to roughly 30 to 40 microsieverts, hundreds of times more than the old backscatter scanners ever delivered. Even so, occasional flights during pregnancy are considered safe. The concern only applies to very frequent flyers, such as airline crew members who fly regularly throughout a pregnancy.
Opting for a Pat-Down
If the scanners still make you uneasy, you have the right to request a pat-down instead. TSA agents will accommodate this request without requiring a reason. The pat-down is conducted by an officer of the same gender and can be done in a private screening area if you prefer. It takes a few extra minutes, so plan accordingly if your connection is tight.
That said, there is no medical reason to avoid the scanners. The Health Physics Society states plainly that passing through an airport security portal does not pose a risk to a pregnant person or an unborn child. Requesting a pat-down is a personal comfort choice, not a safety necessity.
Practical Tips for Pregnant Travelers at Security
- Wear slip-on shoes and minimal metal. Reducing the chance of a secondary screening speeds you through the line, which matters more when you’re dealing with swollen feet or fatigue.
- Keep medications and prenatal vitamins accessible. Place them in a clear bag so they’re easy to pull out if screeners want a closer look.
- Bring an empty water bottle. You can fill it after security to stay hydrated at the gate, which is especially important during pregnancy when dehydration can trigger contractions.
- Use TSA PreCheck or similar programs. Shorter lines mean less time standing, and PreCheck lanes typically use only a metal detector rather than a full-body scanner.