Calculators › Distance and flight time calculator
Airport distance calculator
How far it is between two airports, which way to go, and how long it takes.
Your route
Use ICAO or IATA codes. Don’t know one? Use the airport search.
What great-circle distance means
The shortest path between two points on a sphere is a great circle. On a flat map it looks curved, which is why a flight from Europe to North America seems to swing north. The calculator uses the haversine formula on a spherical earth with a mean radius of 3,440 NM. Its answers are close to, but not exactly, what an aircraft’s navigation system works out on a more exact model of the earth.
Why there are two bearings
A great circle crosses each line of longitude at a different angle, so the bearing changes along the way. Leaving Heathrow for New York, you start out at about 288° true and arrive heading about 231°. Bearings here are true, not magnetic.
Real flights fly further
This is the shortest possible distance. Real routes follow airways, SIDs and STARs, and they avoid weather and closed airspace, so they’re longer. The flight time here only covers the distance at your cruising groundspeed, with no climb, descent or taxi. For a realistic plan, add those, and use the flight plan builder to write it up. EET is how a flight plan writes the time: 0635 is 6 hours 35 minutes.
Quick answers
How do you calculate the distance between two airports?
Use their latitude and longitude in the haversine formula, which gives the great-circle distance. London Heathrow to New York JFK comes out at about 2,990 NM, or 5,540 km.
How many kilometres are in a nautical mile?
Exactly 1.852 km, which is about 1.15 statute miles. A nautical mile is roughly one minute of latitude.
What is EET in a flight plan?
Estimated elapsed time: how long the flight is expected to take, written as four digits for hours and minutes.
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For training and simulation only. These calculators are for learning and for games. Their results are automatic, and they don’t account for everything a real operation does. Never use them for real flight planning, navigation or air traffic control. Use your official charts, approved tools and procedures.
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