TSA PreCheck allows U.S. travelers to skip the part of airport security where you take your shoes off. For NYT’s the Upshot, Ben Blatt and Christine Chung analyzed wait times at a handful of airports to see if the program really shaves off minutes. The program seems to help most of the time, at New York airports at least.
At these airports — Kennedy, LaGuardia and Newark — PreCheck saves travelers five to 10 minutes on average, according to our analysis. But this will depend on the terminal you’re flying out of and the time of day you’re departing. Sometimes you may save over 30 minutes, sometimes none at all.
At some other major airports, the average time saved appears to be lower than in New York.
A histogram shows the distribution of wait times. The orange side on the right indicates less time waiting with PreCheck than with non-PreCheck. The blue side on the left indicates the same or more.
FlowingData Delivered to Your Inbox
Chart Type Used
