Apparatus for filling and compacting material in bags

A bag filling and compacting apparatus has a conveying device (11) cyclically conveying the bags (b). So that bags of flexible soft packaging material receive a shape with uniform walls during compacting of the filling material settling therein, the conveying device has flight walls and base plates (23) which enclose the bags during the filling and compacting of the filling material fully flat up to the upper edge of the bag. The base plates can be raised and lowered and can be brought into operative association with a vibrating device. The flights travel between lateral guide walls (40,41) which are cyclically movable towards and away from each other during the conveying run to give a package of uniform shape.