The short answer
Crowd avoidance was a genuine reason to fly privately in 2020 and it is not why people still do. The reasons that endure are time — you arrive fifteen minutes before departure and land closer to where you are going — access to thousands of airports airlines do not serve, and control over the schedule. The health argument was real and temporary; the time argument was always the actual product.
Note. This article was written in late 2020 and was about avoiding crowded terminals. That was a real reason at the time. It is not the reason anybody flies privately now, so this is a rewrite about the reasons that lasted.
The temporary reason
In 2020 a lot of people flew privately for the first time because it involved dramatically fewer touchpoints than a commercial terminal. That was a genuine, rational motivation and it brought a large number of first-time users into the category.
Most of the ones who stayed did not stay for that reason.
The reason that lasted: time
The saving is not in the air. A jet cruises somewhat faster than an airliner, and on a two-hour leg that difference is minor.
The saving is on the ground, at both ends.
Departure. You arrive fifteen minutes before the flight. Not ninety. You park near the aircraft, walk out, and go. There is no security queue, no gate, no boarding groups.
Arrival. You are off the aircraft and into a car in minutes.
The airport itself. This is the underrated one. Private aviation reaches thousands of airports airlines do not — over 5,000 public-use fields in the United States against a few hundred with scheduled service. Landing twenty minutes from where you are actually going rather than ninety minutes away is frequently a bigger saving than everything else combined.
Add it up on a normal domestic trip and it is two to four hours door to door, in each direction. For someone whose calendar is the binding constraint on their life, that is the whole product.
The reason people underestimate: control
You name the departure time. If your meeting runs two hours long, the aircraft waits — and on a well-written program that costs nothing, because ground-hold and wait fees are a term worth checking.
You can change the destination in the air. You can add a stop. You can bring the dog. None of these are possible commercially at any price.
The reason people overestimate: the cabin
Private aviation is marketed on interiors. Interiors are pleasant and they are rarely the reason anyone becomes a regular.
On a two-and-a-half hour flight from Teterboro to Palm Beach, the difference between a light jet cabin and a super-mid cabin is real but modest. The difference between fifteen minutes at BCT and ninety minutes at a commercial terminal is not modest at all.
Which is why we spend more time helping people choose the right aircraft category and the right arrival airport than talking about cabin finishes. The category decision is where the money goes; the airport decision is where the day goes.
What has not changed
Every flight is operated by an independently audited FAA Part 135 carrier. That was true in 2020 and it is true now, and how we verify it has not changed either — before every trip, rather than annually.
Related questions
While we are here.
How much time does flying privately actually save?
On a typical domestic trip, two to four hours door to door. Fifteen minutes at the departure airport instead of ninety, no connection, and an arrival field frequently much closer to your destination than the commercial alternative.
How many airports can private jets use?
Thousands more than airlines serve. In the United States alone there are over 5,000 public-use airports; scheduled service reaches a few hundred of them.