Emirates Lounge Melbourne Review

The current Emirates Lounge in Melbourne Tullamarine Airport has been open since early 2016 and is a boldly styled, spacious lounge. It's a popular choice not only for Emirates business class and first class passengers, but also Qantas business class passengers.

Emirates opened this newer and larger lounge to cope with increased demand from its Airbus A380 flights, which have a larger number of business and first class passengers compared to its Boeing 777 flights. The lounge is spacious and has lots of seating to cater to this, and on my visit at approximately 3pm on a Sunday it wasn't very busy.

Points Finder Lounge Rating:

How our ratings work

• Pros
• Cons
• Lounge details

What I liked

Extensive food options

This lounge had a large variety of buffet food options, with both cold and hot selections. Hot meals when I visited included grilled salmon, cannelloni, gourmet-style meat pies, curry dishes, steaks and vegetarian dishes. Cold dishes included options like duck breast on a bed of vegetables and a large selection of cheeses. This lounge also had a kids' menu which is great for families who are travelling.

As is to be expected in an Emirates lounge, there were also Bateel dates on offer.

Variety of alcoholic drinks available

The Emirates Melbourne Lounge has two self-service bars where you can help yourself to a drink. There are also attendants who can help prepare you a drink, although unfortunately there are no cocktails.

Premium spirits and champagne like Moët and Veuve were available, which is good to see as many lounges no longer offer these.

Well designed and stylish

The lounge is very welcoming, mostly because of the colour palette and open-plan design. It's a comfortable lounge to sit in, with plenty of windows and natural light, which is a stark contrast to some of the other lounges in Melbourne Airport such as the Qantas International Business Lounge and the Singapore Airlines SilverKris Lounge.

Emirates is well known for its bold styling, and this lounge is no different. It has Italian marble floors and leather sofas, Rolex wall clocks and beautiful timber work.

This lounge also has a water feature, which is nice to sit by and adds to the ambience.

Great showers

The shower facilities in this lounge were immaculate, and a nice change from some of the disappointing shower facilities you see in some other lounges.

Shower packs were readily available, with all the amenities you'd need to freshen up before your flight.

What I didn't like

Business area lacked privacy

The business area in this lounge wasn't very private. If you need to make a sensitive business call of do some banking you'll be surrounded by other guests which isn't ideal.

Other lounges in the Emirates network still have a private room for business, which I think this lounge could benefit from.

No à la carte menu

It would've been nice to see an à la carte menu in this lounge, even if it was a small menu with 2-3 dishes. Many lounges are now offering this and it adds to the experience for passengers.

An a la carte menu would be great, but the existing food options are still excellent. Image: Mehron M/Finder

Lounge is shared between business and first class passengers

Business and first class passengers share this lounge. This isn't a huge issue for business class travellers, but if you're travelling in first class, you might be better off visiting the Qantas International First Lounge where the food and drink better reflects the first class price tag.

No cocktail menu

It would've been nice to see this lounge offer even a small cocktail menu to add to the experience.

However, as mentioned above, this lounge does have two self-service bars with some premium spirits and champagne so it's not all bad in this department.

Points Finder Lounge Rating: 4/5 stars

THE FINDER LOUNGE REVIEW PROMISE: Our lounge reviews are based on a visit to the actual lounge during normal operation. We offer an honest and open critique from one of our frequent flyer experts and update with any relevant news as it comes to hand. Being in a lounge should always be more pleasant than just being stuck with waiting at the gate, but we won't shy away from highlighting issues. Learn more about how our scoring works.

Emirates Lounge Melbourne details

Opening hours

• 4am-6am, 3:30pm-10:15pm

Location

• International terminal, gate 10

Access

• Emirates business and first class passengers, Qantas business and first class passengers
• Skywards Gold and Platinum frequent flyers (they can also take in a guest)
• Qantas Gold, Platinum, Platinum One frequent flyers
• Paid access (non-Skywards members US$130 plus GST, Skywards members US$100 plus GST)