Have you flown out of Fort Lauderdale lately? If so, you probably won’t be shocked to learn that although it’s smaller and easier to navigate than Miami International, South Florida’s second-largest airport is much slower when it comes to getting through security. In fact, it’s the slowest in the nation.
Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport—a major hub for Allegiant Air, JetBlue and Spirit Airlines—has the longest TSA security line of any large airport hub in the country, according to a new study. Travelers are spending an average of 15 minutes and 27 seconds ambling through the line before they can finally kick back and relax at their gate (or the Air Margaritaville bar).
That’s a whopping 13 minutes and 19 seconds longer than O'Hare International Airport in Chicago, which had the fastest average TSA lines in the study. Another Florida airport, Tampa International, came in at No. 11 with a snail-like average TSA wait time of 10 minutes and 20 seconds.
The study was conducted by data collection experts SOAX, who analyzed data from Qsensor on security wait times at America's 31 largest airport hubs (over 10 million passengers in 2023). TSA wait times were gathered for each hour of each day of the week, creating an average for each airport and highlighting the busiest and least busy times to go through security.
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Wednesday is the busiest day to go through security at Fort Lauderdale Airport, the study found, and Monday is the quietest. If you must fly through FLL, avoid arriving at 5am at all costs—that’s when average wait times peak at 24 minutes and 51 seconds. Unsurprisingly, 2am is the quietest time, with an average wait of 34 seconds.
There is some good news for Fort Lauderdale and its sad airport security lines: Earlier this year, the Federal Aviation Administration allocated $50 million in funding to FLL, the largest portion granted to any airport in the country. These funds will be used to help improve connectivity between terminals, making it easier to move through secured areas without exiting and re-entering a security checkpoint.
Check out which other major airports in the country have clogged up security lines below.
America’s largest airport hubs with the longest TSA security lines
- Fort Lauderdale–Hollywood International Airport: 15:27
- Charlotte Douglas International Airport: 15:06
- Los Angeles International Airport: 14:29
- San Diego International Airport: 14:14
- John F. Kennedy International Airport: 12:54
- Harry Reid International Airport: 12:01
- Austin–Bergstrom International Airport: 11:49
- Salt Lake City International Airport: 11:39
- San Francisco International Airport: 11:23
- Baltimore/Washington International Airport: 10:31
Despite having 10 million more passengers in 2023 than any other airport in America, Hartsfield–Jackson Atlanta International Airport has one of the shortest security lines on average, at six minutes and five seconds. Another major hub, Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport, had the second-fastest wait times at three minutes and 49 seconds.
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