JFKTerminal 4
How long is the TSA security line at JFK Terminal 4 right now?
At 11:50 am Eastern JFK Terminal 4 reads 22 min standard, 1 min PreCheck. By TSA's counts 11 am is usually a middling hour at JFK Terminal 4, about 1,200 people an hour across its checkpoints against 2,800 at the 6 am peak. Terminal 4 screens about 37,000 people a day, more than all but 20 of the 431 airports TSA counts.
Wait time by checkpoint
| Checkpoint | Standard | PreCheck |
|---|---|---|
| Terminal 4 | 22min | 1min |
Read from jfkairport.com at 6 minutes ago, next read in 3
How busy Terminal 4 security usually is
People screened per hour at each checkpoint, averaged over 133 days of TSA counts, 22 March to 5 September 2026. Green is that checkpoint's quiet hours, red its peak. Find your checkpoint and look along the row for green.
| Checkpoint | 4a | 6a | 8a | 10a | 11 am, now | 12p | 2p | 4p | 6p | 8p | 10p | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Delta 1 | ||||||||||||||||||||
| FIS CP | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Main |
Tap a cell for its count.
Quiet for this checkpointIts busiest hourclosed or no count
On the counted days JFK Terminal 4 screened passengers in every hour of the day. Across JFK Terminal 4 the busiest hour is 6 am and the counts fall away after 7 pm. Most checkpoints peak from noon on; Main runs the other way at 6 am. TSA counts people, not minutes, so this shows when a checkpoint is loaded, not how long you will stand in it.
How big Terminal 4 is
Over the 133 counted days, 22 March to 5 September 2026, Terminal 4 screened about 37,000 people a day. That is more than all but 20 of the 431 airports TSA counts, between MSP and DTW on the national list. It is 40 percent of everyone screened at JFK. TSA counts 3 checkpoints inside it, Main about 33,000, FIS CP about 3,000 and Delta 1 about 1,100 people a day, while the feed publishes one number for the whole terminal.
The busiest airports by people screened ranks every code TSA counts on the same figure.
Questions people ask
How long are TSA lines at JFK Terminal 4 today?
At 11:50 am Eastern JFK Terminal 4 reads 22 min standard, 1 min PreCheck. By TSA's counts 11 am is usually a middling hour at JFK Terminal 4, about 1,200 people an hour across its checkpoints against 2,800 at the 6 am peak. Terminal 4 screens about 37,000 people a day, more than all but 20 of the 431 airports TSA counts.
How early should I arrive at JFK Terminal 4?
waittimes.io does not predict a wait, so it cannot tell you an hour to leave home. What it can tell you is when the line is longest: over 133 counted days TSA screened the most people at JFK Terminal 4 at 6 am, and the counts are lowest between the rushes at 9 am before falling away after 7 pm. The sign above carries the wait the airport published at its last read; your airline's own advice covers check-in and bag drop.
Does PreCheck have a shorter line at JFK Terminal 4?
Right now PreCheck at JFK Terminal 4 reads 1 min. Standard lanes read 22 min. TSA's counts do not separate PreCheck from standard lanes, so the map below is every lane together.
When is TSA security at JFK Terminal 4 quietest?
Over the 133 counted days, 22 March to 5 September 2026, JFK Terminal 4 checkpoints screened the most people at 6 am. Between the rushes the counts are lowest at 9 am, and they fall away after 7 pm. Each row of the map above is one checkpoint scaled to its own peak, so its green hours are the ones to aim for. Counts say when a checkpoint is loaded, not how long the line is.
What time does TSA open at JFK Terminal 4?
Over the 133 counted days, 22 March to 5 September 2026, JFK Terminal 4 screened passengers in every hour of the day. Main opens first and runs latest. These are the hours TSA counted people, not JFK Terminal 4's published checkpoint hours. Check the airport's own page before an early flight.
How current is this number?
The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey publishes the JFK wait times at jfkairport.com, terminal by terminal, and waittimes.io reads them every 10 minutes. The time on the sign is the last read, in Eastern time. A number older than 30 minutes says so, and a feed silent for 2 hours shows when it last published instead of a number. Nothing here is predicted.
The other JFK terminals
Every JFK terminal is on the JFK page, one row each with its standard and PreCheck lanes at the same read. The national page ranks every covered airport by its longest line right now.
Where the numbers come from
- Wait times
- Published by The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey at jfkairport.com, terminal by terminal. We read the page every 10 minutes and show the time of the last read. A reading older than 30 minutes is marked as such.
- Usual busyness
- TSA's own hourly passenger counts for Terminal 4's 3 checkpoints, published weekly in its FOIA reading room. This page uses 133 days of counts, 22 March to 5 September 2026. Public domain.
- Who reads them
- Arcane Digital, which runs waittimes.io, reads every feed every 10 minutes with its own collector and stores the time of each read. The day's reads are checked every night for a feed that has stopped or thinned, and one person reads that report the next morning. Nobody types a number in.
- What we never do
- Predict a wait in minutes, or show an old number as if it were current.
- Every feed
- How each one is read, the TSA counts and who to write to: the sources page.