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Lie flat car seat- which is the best

20 replies

Sikantiskatinas · 09/07/2020 19:37

I’m due with my 2nd child, and started looking some travel systems/ car seats just trying to decide what best would suit my and my baby’s needs. I live in country right at quite busy road, which is not very safe to take pram on. I was looking into some lie flat car seats, which can be used as a carrycot too. It would suit our needs perfectly as it means baby can stay in lie flat position for longer periods of time and wouldn’t need to be wakes up to transfer from car seat to carrycot. Which one you found best? I had checked cybex cloud , but I been told that even its suppose to be lie flat, it’s still recommended not to keep young babies for longer than 2hours in it, which kinda defeats its purpose. The thing I liked about it though, that it can fit on many other brand frames with right attachments. Then I checked Jane Matrix, which only goes with Jane pram frames, but so far from what I found, it can be used as a carrycot. That seems to be perfect , as I don’t fancy dragging separate carrycot with me all the time we’re going for a trip, which obviously would take up space in my small car. What did u find worked best for u?

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LouiseTrees · 09/07/2020 20:30

You are not meant to keep a baby in any car seat for longer than 2 hours. What about a maxi cosi jade which is actually a car carrycot rather than a lie flat seat?

justanothersugar · 09/07/2020 20:37

We have the kiddy I-size (I think - it’s going back a few years) which can lie flat in the car as well as part of a travel system. Might be one to check out?

HardonCollider · 09/07/2020 20:45

I have a Jane iMatrix. We use it normally in the car and then it lies flat when it’s on the pushchair. Sadly it’s not had much use due to lockdown, but it has been useful to be able to move DC straight from car to pram without waking (the movement to lie flat doesn’t wake, thankfully). It does take up quite a lot of space behind the passenger seat when fitted in the car but I’ve got nothing to compare it to really. It may just be a bad choice of car! I’ve not used it lying flat when in the car as I believe it’s not particularly safe.

zaffa · 09/07/2020 20:49

I had the Jane transporter 2 which had no time limits. Absolutely brilliant - I was so much happier with DD in it even just coming home from the hospital because we lived more than 20 mins away and it would have been awful to have to stop on that journey.
They take up two seats in the car though - but they are brilliant. Can't recommend enough. If you get the Jane chassis it clips on as a normal carry cot too.

zaffa · 09/07/2020 20:52

Oh also we bought the car seat after the pram so the two were not compatible and I have a tiny fiat punto so it was a nightmare having to fit the full pram and carry cot in and then also the car seat! So definitely whatever you get, get the corresponding pram chassis
And be careful because some are normal car seats that can then lie flat for the pram but don't lie flat in the car. The transporter kat across two seats in the back and was exactly like a carry cot - nothing like a car seat :)

GrumpyHoonMain · 09/07/2020 20:54

I have the cybex dream - it has a 360 rotating base which is useful.

welshladywhois40 · 09/07/2020 20:54

I had a jane matrix seat with my first. When he was tiny I had to do a 4.5 hour journey on my own and I wouldn't have managed without the lie flat seat - doing 2 1/4 hour driving stints.

I also used mine as bed for the odd night away. - you can get a mattress to put in the base.

For walks I found it great as all you need in the car is the base so you aren't carting a carrycot around.

Lastly and this was a big plus - if he felt asleep in the car I would bring him in asleep, loosen the straps and let him sleep. I know people will stay this is wrong but with this car seat they are trully flat in the same way they would be in a cot

ShyTown · 09/07/2020 20:58

We had the Kiddy one, it can go fully flat in the car, doesn’t take up a ton of space (fits in a Golf behind the passenger seat) and can go on a variety of pram frames with adapters. My only complaint is that the handle is the flat to upright mechanism so to pick it up you have to put it upright and most of the time that woke up DD! Otherwise brilliant and I’d definitely recommend it.

Retrovibe89 · 09/07/2020 21:16

I had the Cybex cloud q (the newer version is the cloud z) and would really recommend that seat. It was so much easier to be able to lie the seat flat on the pram and she was really comfortable in it

Sikantiskatinas · 09/07/2020 22:25

I been told at the pram shop that cybex cloud isn’t recommended as a carrycot, because even in lie flat position it isn’t completely flat. Problem is, I don’t really have space in my car for base, car seat and carrycot, so ideally would be looking for something that newborn would be able to travel in and sleep in for few hours or so.

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LouLou2020 · 09/07/2020 22:34

I had this one (Jane matrix light 2) and it’s been brilliant, I could move my baby from car to house etc. and not have to worry about waking him up when taking in/out of a traditional car seat. I’d definitely recommend getting the isofix base as although the seat is compatible with seat belts the base made it much easier to put in the car.

www.jane-uk.com/Mobile/en/Jane-Matrix-Light-2-Lie-flat-Car-Seat/m-m-1087.aspx

Newdaynewname1 · 10/07/2020 18:07

We had the cybex one, loved it. Don’t get one of the carrycot/over 2 seats version, their crashtest results are awful.

Blastandbollocks · 10/07/2020 18:09

Jane Matrix. We bought the mattress and it was a fab travel cot until DS outgrew it.

Rubychard · 10/07/2020 18:39

Jane matrix. But it was 15 years ago!

Mir230 · 10/07/2020 19:31

Following this with interest as like you OP I had the idea that I could use the Cybex lie flat car seat as a carry cot. Disappointed to hear we shouldn't use it as such!

I'd originally discounted the Jane because of the huge expense, however I see the website has some fairly good package deals. Crosswalk or Epic seem ok? I was looking for something with the minimum of faff when folding into the boot in winter!!

LouLou2020 · 10/07/2020 22:47

I’m not sure where “ Don’t get one of the carrycot/over 2 seats version, their crashtest results are awful.” has come from. The lie flat seat we had which lay across two seats had good safety reviews by Which. There are concerns that the car seat could be incorrectly attached to the isofix base but we never had this issue and made sure to double check every time we put it in the car.

BertieBotts · 12/07/2020 09:01

Jane Matrix gets really bad safety results IIRC. Maxi Cosi Jade gets good safety results but it's about £300! Britax used to do one, but they have retracted it now. They have a setting in their babysafe 2 i-size when used with the fancier base to give a better recline inside their ordinary infant car seat. Joie i-Gemm has something like this as well. Maxi Cosi Pebble has really good padding which makes it almost flat. Avionaut Ultralite (sold as Venicci in UK) has a flat back design (most infant car seats are curved) but no adjustment of the angle. Those are some lesser-known "lie flat" types. The heavily marketed lie-flat ones are Cybex Cloud, Joie i-Level and a new one from Nuna which is similar to the Joie. (There also used to be Kiddy Evoluna but it's not made any more).

Of all the above seats, everything except Jane and Britax go onto the same Maxi Cosi/Cybex pram adapters. Britax have fairly universal adapters, definitely more than just Britax prams, but not as many as the more widespread car seat adapters. The Britax adapters are called Click & Go and tend to be available for brands which have a presence in America.

None of these lie flat seats (except carrycots) are truly flat, so none are realistically usable as a carrycot. You can probably relax over the guidance a bit with them, e.g. drive on a bit longer than 2 hours on a longish trip or let the baby finish a nap in their seat (under supervision) even if over 2 hours by the end of the nap, but I definitely would not use for as long as overnight sleep. The max recommended angle for overnight sleeping spaces is 10 degrees, and none of the lie flat car seats go that low - more like 20-30.

To save space in the car, I would look for a pushchair where the seat can double up as carrycot (parent facing and lie flat), or one which is compatible with a soft carrycot, and a well rated car seat for the car travel.

If you mean that you want something you can use as a travel bed for the baby, carrycots are no good for this anyway as they outgrow them by about 4 months unless you have a tiny baby, more like 8-12 weeks if you have a big baby and how much travelling are you realistically expecting to do in the first 3-4 months? You can get some really compact pop up travel cots, or often rent a cot/travel cot where you're staying, if you need to save space in the car while travelling.

BertieBotts · 12/07/2020 09:02

www.which.co.uk/reviews/child-car-seats/jane-matrix-light-2-isofix

BertieBotts · 12/07/2020 09:06

Aah no that is just the safety warning for being hard to attach to the base.

I can't find the poor crash test now, but I've defo seen it. The problem is that company have rather heavy handed lawyers who go around threatening to sue any website which publishes a negative review/opinion on their safety so the crash test videos etc don't stick around for very long.

BertieBotts · 12/07/2020 09:14

If you get a carrycot seat which goes over 2 seats and it's approved to R44/04, that seat doesn't have to pass a safety crash test. Just so you know. It only has to pass a test of not being able to be pulled out of place by a person.

Under R129 they do have to pass a crash test, but it's a very minimal one (basically: Does the dummy get ejected from the seat) and the newborn dummies they use to test these seats do not have as many sensors as the ones based on older children, so there isn't very good data about whether the forces on the baby in an accident would cause injury, even if they get rated well by Which etc.

The amount of accidents IRL with these seats in place is also very low, because they are rarely used and where they are used, it's for a short period of time, so we do not have very good data about their RL safety.

Of course marketing won't say this explicitly, because nobody is going to buy a car seat sold as not offering much crash protection, but carrycots have never really been designed to offer crash protection, they are designed to offer a better breathing position in the car and seen as a compromise.

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