Comment by Analemma_
2 days ago
It depends on the airport and when you show up, but walking straight through security with TSA PreCheck is becoming less and less of a sure thing. At SeaTac, checkpoint #5 is PreCheck only and it can still take 20-40 minutes at busy periods.
It's probably still worth it, but just keep an eye on checkpoint wait times if your airport publishes them and don't just assume PreCheck means you can show up whenever.
I find you can really breeze through security if you've got wheelchair assistance for someone in your party.
Of course, you might end up waiting an hour for the chair.
Clear is the new PreCheck. So many people have PreCheck that it is frequently not significantly faster now.
I’ve seen airports where Clear is slower than Precheck. It’s all dependent on your local airport and the types of travelers it tends to attract. My home airport still has pretty quick Precheck lines. My last flight, I needed to check a bag. I walked into the terminal 70 minutes before departure (not my plan). I had my bag checked, through security, and seated at my gate 55 minutes before departure. I haven’t always been so lucky but the odds were in my favor that day.
This is PDX, not the biggest airport but not a tiny one either.
I had Clear and my girlfriend didn’t and we raced. She did win sometimes, but always when the lines are so short you don’t care much anyway. I’ve yet to see a situation where the lines were long and Clear isn’t much faster.
She ended up getting it after the last incident.