I will present our results on phonon-induced orbital and spin relaxation rates of single electron states in lateral single and double quantum dots. The rates are calculated as a function of magnetic field and interdot coupling, at various field and quantum dot orientations. We find that besides the anisotropy of the rates (dependence on the orientation of the magnetic field) known from the single dot case, there is an additional much stronger anisotropy of different origin in the double dot case. This new anisotropy is due to the anticrossing induced by the spin-orbit interactions and can be exploited to measure the linear spin-orbit couplings. We find configurations where the anticrossing influence on the spin relaxation rate is turned off enabling long lifetime of a spin qubit.