JFK Terminal 4: airlines, gates, and how to get there

Twenty airlines check in at Terminal 4, and Delta Air Lines is the anchor. JFK is one of its hubs, its whole JFK operation sits in this building, and its joint-venture and SkyTeam partners follow it here, so Aeromexico, KLM Royal Dutch Airlines, LATAM, Virgin Atlantic and WestJet all check in at Terminal 4 too.

Three Delta partners do not. Air France, China Eastern and Korean Air use Terminal 1, which catches out connecting passengers who assume the alliance keeps everyone under one roof.

The full list:

• Aeromexico
• Air Europa
• Air India
• Arkia Israeli Airlines
• Avianca (committed to Terminal 6)
• Caribbean Airlines
• China Airlines (committed to the New Terminal One)
• Copa Airlines
• Delta
• El Al
• Emirates
• Etihad (committed to the New Terminal One)
• Kenya Airways
• KLM Royal Dutch Airlines (committed to the New Terminal One)
• LATAM
• Singapore Airlines
• Uzbekistan Airways
• Virgin Atlantic
• WestJet
• Xiamen Airlines

One number worth explaining. Terminal 4's own page says it is home to 22 airlines, while 20 appear against Terminal 4 in the airport's directory as a check-in terminal. The gap is two, nothing official reconciles it, but the directory shows how at least one of them arises: JetBlue Airways checks in at Terminal 5 and lands its international flights at Terminal 4 between 10:30 PM and 5:00 AM. A carrier that uses the building only on arrival counts for the terminal and not for the check-in list. Which airline makes up the second is not something either source says.

Airline allocations at JFK move, because the airport is halfway through a rebuild that runs to 2028, and the terminal overview tracks which of the six are opening, closing or emptying. Terminal 4 is one of the stable ones, so the list above is unlikely to change under you, but your boarding pass is still the last word. If you are not sure which terminal you need, the full airline list for all six terminals covers every carrier at JFK, and Delta's JFK operation goes into what the hub arrangement means for bags and connections.

By public transport, you ride the AirTrain to the door. Terminal 4 has its own station attached to the building, and the AirTrain is free inside the airport loop. The fare starts only when you enter or leave at Jamaica Station or Howard Beach Station, where it is $8.75 one way.

From Manhattan the usual route is the subway to one of those two stations and then the AirTrain, which comes to $11.75 all in: $3 for the subway and $8.75 for the AirTrain. Take the J or Z to Jamaica, or the A to Howard Beach. The Long Island Rail Road to Jamaica is faster and costs more, and a CityTicket within New York City is $5.25 off peak or $7.25 peak on top of the same AirTrain fare. Every route into the city is compared on the guide to getting into Manhattan.

By car, Terminal 4 sits on the Central Terminal Area loop off the Van Wyck Expressway, which is congested often enough that you should not treat a mapping app's estimate as a promise. Delta directs drop-offs to curbside Zones C or D and lets Delta One and Sky Priority customers use Zone B, and puts taxi pickup at the B curb. Those came from a Delta advisory written during the roadway construction, so treat the zone letters as the current arrangement rather than a permanent one.

Pickup arrangements for Uber and Lyft have moved around during construction, and where they move to is exactly the kind of thing that changes between the day this is written and the day you fly, so check the airport's live guidance rather than a fixed answer here. The airport map shows where Terminal 4 sits relative to the other terminals and the AirTrain stations.

Terminal 4's own lot is the Blue Lot, and it is expensive. The gate rate is $6 a half hour, rising to $12 a half hour once you pass a three-hour stay, up to a 24-hour maximum of $94. Charges run in 30-minute increments until they hit that maximum, so a two-hour stay is $24. Booking at least three hours ahead brings the day down to as low as $80, which is the airport's own wording and a floor rather than a quote.

Two things about the Blue Lot are worth taking seriously. Availability is reduced by construction, and prebooking drivers are pointed at the Red Garage next door as the alternative. The Red Garage is Terminal 8's lot, adjacent to this one, and it is the cheapest terminal garage at JFK at $74 a day at the gate and from $62 booked ahead. If your reason for parking at Terminal 4 is convenience rather than price, the Blue Lot earns the difference. If it is not, the Red Garage does the same job for $20 less at the gate, or $18 less booked ahead.

The honest answer for anything longer than a day or two is the Long-Term Parking Lot near Lefferts Boulevard, at $55 a day at the gate and from $39 booked ahead. It undercuts the Blue Lot by at least $39 a day and costs you a free AirTrain ride. Over a week that is a difference of more than $250.

One limit that catches people with rental vans and roof boxes: the Blue Lot has a vehicle height restriction of 6 feet 4 inches, the tightest of the four lots that publish a limit. The Long-Term Lot takes anything up to 11 feet 6 inches. Rates, height limits and the discount rules for drivers with an ADA placard are set out in full on the JFK parking guide.

Terminal 4 has two concourses, A and B, behind a single security checkpoint, and the building runs to more than 135,000 square feet of shops and restaurants alone, which the terminal cheerfully describes as a mile end to end. The walk from security to a gate runs from 3 minutes at the near end of Concourse A to 14 at the far end of Concourse B, and Delta runs a free shuttle bus between the concourses that the terminal itself admits is not always faster than walking. The gate-by-gate walk times, the shuttle stops and the layout of both concourses are on the Terminal 4 map guide.

Terminal 4 has a baggage storage desk that takes bags for a few hours or up to 72 hours, and it will hold them whichever terminal you are flying from. You need a confirmed ticket, you can book ahead or turn up, and bags are subject to TSA inspection. Currency exchange, lost and found, information desks and pet relief areas are all in the building.

For accessibility, Terminal 4 takes part in the Sunflower Lanyard scheme for hidden disabilities. Lanyards are free from the Welcome Center in the Arrivals Hall or the Info Desk in the Retail Hall, and can be requested by email in advance. There is also a separate assistance program for passengers arriving from abroad. Book wheelchair assistance through your airline rather than the terminal, and do it in advance. One constraint the terminal publishes and most guides skip: electric carts run past security, but mobility assistance to gates A9 to A21 and B42 to B54 is by wheelchair only.

Terminal 4's dining spreads across a Retail Hall and both concourses, with sit-down restaurants and grab-and-go counters, and the terminal says vegan, vegetarian and gluten-free options are spread throughout rather than clustered in one place. The practical point is when you eat, not what: clear security first if you have the time, because the queue is the part of the trip that goes wrong here. Where to actually eat, landside and airside, is covered on the Terminal 4 food guide.

Nine lounges operate at Terminal 4, more than at any other JFK terminal, and the mix runs from three Delta spaces through the Centurion, Chase Sapphire and 24-hour Capital One credit card lounges to the Emirates, Virgin Atlantic and Air India rooms near Gate A5. Nothing here sells entry at the door any more: HelloSky, which did, closed on May 31, 2026. A card that grants access does not guarantee a seat at peak, and a lounge listed at Terminal 4 is not automatically near your gate. Every lounge, with its hours, location and who gets in, is on the Terminal 4 lounges guide.

Twenty airlines and two concourses feed Terminal 4's security, and the terminal publishes one set of walk times from it, so plan on one queue rather than a choice of them. About half the passengers are on international flights, which check in earlier and arrive in bigger waves. The standard advice of three hours before an international departure and two before a domestic one is a floor here rather than a comfortable target, particularly in the morning bank when the long-haul departures cluster.

Use T4 Reserve. The terminal runs a free service that lets you book a security time slot in advance. Slots open seven days before your flight, availability varies by airline and destination, and when you arrive you follow the RESERVE signs and show your QR code to an ambassador. It costs nothing and it is the single most useful thing on this page for a departing passenger.

TSA PreCheck and CLEAR both operate at Terminal 4 and both help, though neither is worth buying for one trip.

Arriving from abroad, Terminal 4 handles about half its passengers on international flights, so the immigration hall is a real queue rather than a formality. Mobile Passport Control shortens it. Global Entry shortens it further, and Terminal 4 is one of the places you can do the interview, scheduled through US Customs and Border Protection rather than the airport.

Security waits at JFK move week to week with staffing, so no figure published on any guide is worth planning against. Check the live wait time on the day. Current security waits at JFK covers where to look and what actually predicts a bad morning.

• Book a T4 Reserve slot the week before you fly. It is free, it takes two minutes, and a bad morning at a security queue shared by 20 airlines costs you an hour you did not budget.
• If you are connecting from Terminal 1 to Terminal 4, allow an hour on the ground. Delta's own guidance is that you collect and re-check your bags after clearing customs, and that the process can take up to an hour. A short connection on paper is not a short connection here.
• Check your gate before you decide where to wait. The far end of Concourse B is a 10 to 14 minute walk from security and the near end of Concourse A is 3 to 6. Sitting at the wrong end of the terminal turns a comfortable boarding into a jog.
• Park in the Red Garage, not the Blue Lot, unless the walk matters. The airport's own note on the Blue Lot points prebookers next door to it, it is the cheapest terminal garage at JFK, and it saves $20 a day at the gate over Terminal 4's own lot.
• Arriving late at night on JetBlue, check the terminal twice. JetBlue Airways checks in at Terminal 5 but lands international flights at Terminal 4 between 10:30 PM and 5:00 AM, which surprises people meeting arriving passengers.
• Store your bags here even if you fly from elsewhere. Terminal 4's baggage storage desk takes bags from passengers using any JFK terminal, for a few hours or up to 72.