Private charter flights can take you anywhere, anytime. And they are surprisingly affordable rather than luxurious. This how to article will guide you through rates, destinations, aircraft, empty legs, and different ways of booking a private charter flight.

Demystifying Private Air Travel

Common misconception suggests that chartering a plane is only for the rich and famous. It’s something for a very special occasion, something unobtainable, or something too expensive to provide genuine value. These misconceptions are often based on a belief that all private aircraft are like those used by presidents and movie stars.

Private charter flights are commonly associated with luxury. The real luxury of a private jet is the time you can save. The vast majority of charter aircraft are simple and comfortable. They don’t have gold-gilded bathrooms, four-posted beds, or unnecessary opulence. But they can take you from A to B faster than any other mode of transport.

The Value of Air Charter is the Time You Save

To understand the price of an air charter you need to calculate the value of the time you will save. Chartered aircraft fly direct, rather than using the hub and spoke routing of commercial airlines. They use airport FBOs, private terminals where you can turn up just 15 minutes before the flight and sometimes drive straight onto the runway. You can take off and touch down at a choice of runways and airports too small for commercial aircraft. That means you take off and land closer to your ultimate end destinations.

All commercial flights run to a schedule. Miss a flight and you can take the next scheduled departure, sometimes for no cost with a flexible ticket. But when is the next flight? Private charter flights are designed around you. They are completely flexible to the changes you demand. If you are late the plane will wait. If you need to depart earlier the charter can change. Such incredible flexibility augments the time you are already saving.

Prices & Rates for Private Charter Flights

The price of all private charter flights depends on three factors:

• The price per flying hour for the aircraft
• The duration of the flight
• Any additional costs, such as an empty return leg or a fuel surcharge

Note that you do not pay for a seat. You pay for the entire aircraft. Charting a Boeing 737 can be very cost effective, if you fill the seats. Flying solo in a 12-seat plane is 12 times more expensive per person than flying with 11 friends in the same 12-seat plane.

This guide on how much is a private jet flight will explain the prices is more detail.

Indicative Base Prices For Different Charter Aircraft

Every aircraft has its own price per flying hour. Larger aircraft are understandably more expensive. You will also pay more for new aircraft, along with planes with a greater range or maximum speed. Although there are thousands of aircraft on the market, there’s only marginal variation between planes of the same size.

Turboprops are very fuel efficient when running at low speeds and low altitudes. They are best for flights under 500 nautical miles with less than nine passengers. Prices are typically USD 1400 – 2200 per flying hour.

Light jets fly higher, longer and faster than turboprops, usually with the same number of passengers. They are very popular on major business routes and cost USD 2000 – 3200 per flying hour.

Mid-sized jets are a more powerful version of light jets. They have a longer range of up to 2000 nautical miles. These planes have more space although most have a similar passenger capacity with nine seats. USD 3000 – 3600 is a rough price per flying hour.

Heavy jets have a typical passenger capacity of 10 – 19, but this can be higher with club style seating. They also have a range of up to 4000 nautical miles. Heavy jets are bigger and may have additional luxuries like beds. USD 5000 per flying hour is a good base for calculating costs.

Jet airliners are the aircraft used for almost all commercial flights. They range from 25 seats to enormous 500-seat aircraft. With their range and size they are good for specific occasions, but do not offer the everyday value of other aircraft.

This aircraft for charter guide will provide you with more information about different jets and when they are best used.

Extra Costs

The costs do get confusing with some operators. For example, some private jet cards implement more than 30 additional costs, from federal tax to airport FBO and peak date surcharges. Every operator is different – some have no extra costs – and it’s recommended to book a private charter flight where the pricing is fully transparent. The price you are quoted should be the price you pay.

Private Charter Flight Destinations

Commercial flights connect major cities and airports. Air charters can fly to more than 2500 airports in the US alone. Teterboro Airport is the busiest private airport in the US and that’s because of its proximity to Manhattan and central New York. Other charter customers benefit from flying to very remote airstrips instead of having to land in the city nearest their destination.

With private charter flights you rarely need to think about the destination because you can fly just about anywhere. This saves time. Take off closer to where you are and touch down closer to your final destination. That means shorter ground transportation and also the opportunity to visit multiple places in multiple states in a single day.

This article will guide you through the most popular air charter routes and this one celebrates the world’s best airport FBOs.

Wait a Moment – Are Charter Flights Safe?

Car crashes happen every day while aircraft incidents are highly publicized. In the US there are 5 million annual accidents on the road and your chances of dying in a motor vehicle is 1 in 98 over a lifetime. There are less than 20 air accidents per year and the odds of dying are 1 in 7,178.

All flights are governed by the FAA and written into law through the Code of Federal Regulations. This article on are private jets safe will answer some of your questions about air charter safety. You may also be interested in learning more about FAA Part 135 regulations.

Here’s a quick overview of how you stay safe in the air.

A FAA Part 91 certificate is the minimum requirement for all aircraft, including jets flown for pleasure. At Airvel we do not believe that Part 91 is a sufficiently stringent certification for a private charter flight. Statistics show that you are 12 times more likely to have an incident on a Part 91 aircraft than a Part 135 aircraft.

Any airline or operator with an aircraft for charter should have a Part 135 certificate. These more rigorous protocols help to make private charter flights as safe as commercial flights. You can read further about forthcoming changes to FAA Part 135 operations here. Part 121 is the FAA regulation applicable to commercial flights.

As an aviation technology company, Airvel plays an essential role in the air charter regulatory environment. Airvel joins up safety data from different sources, such as the FAA, Wyvern and Argus. This data is used to flag safety related issues, before incidents and errors occur.

How to Book Private Charter Flights

There are a variety of options for booking a private charter flight. Some are better value than others and this will depend on your own circumstances. These options also vary in terms of the financial investment that is required to access the charter market.

With a fractional jet ownership you purchase a fraction of a jet and receive a set number of flying hours per year in return (the lowest is a 1/16th share which equates to 50 hours). You must use the same type of aircraft for every flight and will share additional costs for maintenance, pilot and storage. This is now a mostly antiquated and costly approach to flying on a private jet. Read all about fractional jet ownership here.

More than 1500 private jet brokers can arrange your charter flight with some of the more than 2500 air charter operators. For this they charge a commission. No training or certification is required to become a private jet broker – as the brokers like to explain, you just need a mobile phone with Wi-Fi. Fragmentation and a lack of true accreditation led to reduced trust in brokers and a surge towards jet cards. Brokers are also limited by their own networks and can only arrange charters with the operators they partner with. Read all about private jet brokers here.

Private jet cards are the most common means of booking a private charter flight. You will need to pre-purchase a set number of hours on a specific type of jet. There are over 350 jet card programs on the market and their quality varies dramatically. Some implement over 30 surcharges, some charge membership fees, some will allow you to roll hours into the next calendar year and others will not. Read more about private jet cards and comparing jet card programs.

Pay as you fly is the most flexible way to book private charter flights. You can charter a different aircraft dependent on the requirements of the flight. No financial investment is needed so this approach is more accessible, especially to casual and first-time charter customers. But how do you charter an aircraft? How do you get a good deal when there are more than 2500 operators and over 4000 charter planes in the US? These questions once led charter customers towards the ease of a jet card. With Airvel there is now a simple way to pay as you fly.

Airvel – the World’s Leading Booking Engine for Private Charter Flights

Airvel is the world’s leading booking engine for private jet charters. It searches over 4000 aircraft with flights to over 2500 destinations just in the US.

Think of Airvel like Skyscanner, Kayak or Google Flights. Except Airvel is for private charter flights instead of scheduled commercial flights.

Just search for a charter with the destinations and dates you need. Then filter the results based on the price, number of passengers, amenities, and type of aircraft. The pricing is 100% transparent. What you see is what you pay as Airvel picks up a small percentage from the operator, not the customer.

With the Airvel website and app you can search all the possibility and charter the aircraft that is best for each flight. This pay as you fly approach means no memberships, no long-term commitments, no pre-investment and no unnecessary barriers. Just pay for the flights you want to book.

At Airvel we believe anybody can fly on a private jet and realize the luxury of the time that is saved. Our mission is to make private charter flights accessible to all. So everyone can enjoy their benefits.