Dinner in Manhattan, breakfast in London
New York to London is the most flown private route across the Atlantic. Eastbound is the shorter direction, with the jet stream behind you: a heavy jet crosses in about six hours forty-five. Ultra-long-range cabins are faster and quieter. A super-midsize jet refuels at Gander or Shannon and arrives about an hour later at a lower price.
The five-hour time difference makes the overnight the natural pattern. Leave Teterboro at 8 pm, sleep, and land at Farnborough at 8 am with the day ahead. Farnborough opens at 7 am and Biggin Hill at 6.30 am, so we time the departure to the airport; Luton and Stansted are open around the clock.
Teterboro caps aircraft at 100,000 lb, so VIP airliners leave from JFK or Newark; Westchester is the quieter departure for the Upper East Side and Connecticut.
Which airport to leave from and which to land at are set out in our guides to the private jet airports in New York and the private jet airports in London: FBOs, customs and curfews, side by side.