Empty leg flights to and from Zurich

Zurich is usually counted among the six busiest business aviation airports in Europe, with around twenty six thousand private and corporate movements a year, and it works hard in every season. On a weekday the traffic is banking, insurance and the head offices around the lake; from December to April it is skiers heading for St Moritz, Davos, Klosters and Laax; and for one week in January it is the World Economic Forum, when a thousand extra flights pass through a single airport.

What turns that traffic into empty legs is that Zurich is full. Every instrument flight needs an airport slot, the evening ends early for business aircraft, and parking for them is scarce, scarcer still whenever something big is on. An aircraft that has delivered its passengers rarely has anywhere to wait, so it leaves, and the flight out is one you can buy.

Empty legs to and from Zurich right now

The board below lists every sector our operator network has released into or out of Zurich. If Zurich is quiet, the board adds flights at Basel, Bern, St Gallen, Samedan, Friedrichshafen and, in Forum week, Dübendorf instead, because each of them is a drive or a short hop away and all of them take the traffic Zurich cannot.

Also moving across the other fields in northern and eastern Switzerland

Sectors on this list do not touch Zurich itself. They are shown because the fields are close enough that the drive rarely costs you more than waiting for the right sector does. Tell us which one interests you and we will confirm it is still open.

Where Zurich sectors come from

Zurich produces empty sectors for three separate reasons, and since one of them is business, one is skiing and one is a single January week, there is no month when all three are asleep.

The aircraft mix reflects a financial centre rather than a beach. Light and midsize jets such as the Phenom 300 and the Citation XLS do most of the British routes, but Zurich sees far more large cabin traffic than a holiday island does, from Challengers to Globals, because a board meeting moves more people further than a family weekend. That is why a Zurich sector can be an eight seat midsize one week and a fourteen seat heavy jet the next, and why the discount on the bigger aircraft is often the most striking one on the board.

Zurich Airport in detail

Zurich runs to a detailed set of rules and applies them consistently. None of it is difficult for a handler that works there every day, but every line below changes the way a private flight into Zurich is planned.

The row most people miss is the evening one. Zurich is not open around the clock for private aircraft, and a plan that has you leaving a dinner in the old town at ten for a flight home that night is unlikely to work. Book the return for the late afternoon or early evening, or for the following morning after six.

The General Aviation Center and its handlers

Private passengers at Zurich never enter the main terminal. They use the General Aviation Center, a separate building on Bimenzältenstrasse on the eastern side of the airport, handed over in December 1974 and home to the business aviation handlers ever since. Which handler meets you is decided by your operator, but it helps to know the names.

They work out of the General Aviation Center, with Jet Aviation also holding the former ExecuJet site opposite, so the difference between them lies in the lounge, the service and the car arrangements rather than in the walk to the aircraft, which is always escorted. The operator chooses the handler, but it is worth asking which one it uses, because that decides the lounge you wait in and who looks after your car.

The General Aviation Center from a passenger's side

What happens between the car and the aircraft seat at Zurich, step by step, for a British passenger on the way in or on the way home.

The two things that surprise first time visitors are both about time. The escort and the screening add a few minutes you do not lose at a smaller airport, and on winter mornings the aircraft may need spraying before it can leave. Neither is a problem if the handler knows your plans, and both are a problem if you arrive at the last minute.

Four rules that shape a Zurich trip

None of this makes Zurich an awkward destination. The rules are published, the handlers apply them every day, and they work. It rewards planning more than most, and it is unforgiving of the idea that a private aircraft can simply leave whenever the dinner ends.

What the ground costs at Zurich

Switzerland adds no passenger tax to a private flight, but Zurich is not a cheap airport, and the charges fall into three places.

The evening shows up on the bill as well as in the timetable. Zurich's noise charge sorts aircraft into five classes and adds time of day surcharges from 21:00 and again between 06:00 and 07:00, and each handler sets its own premium for work outside its staffed hours. At big events it gets steeper: for the World Economic Forum in January 2026, handling cost 50 per cent extra between 22:00 and 06:00 and 100 per cent extra between 23:00 and 05:00, with a flat event fee of 1,000 francs on drop and go flights. None of this appears on an empty leg price, which is quoted as a sector, but it matters if you are pricing a full charter against one.

The absence of a Swiss levy on private flights is not an accident. Parliament passed a charge of between 500 and 3,000 francs per flight on business aircraft as part of a new CO2 law in 2020, the voters threw that law out in June 2021, and when the idea came back both chambers rejected it in 2023, so the revised law in force since January 2025 contains nothing of the kind. The question has not gone away, though: in September 2026 the upper house turned down a cantonal proposal for a tax on short haul tickets, which now goes to the lower house. Swiss VAT is 8.1 per cent, and a visitor can reclaim it on purchases of 300 francs or more on a single receipt, provided the goods leave the country within ninety days and the export papers are stamped by customs, which can be done at the General Aviation Center before you board.

Basel, Bern, St Gallen, Samedan and the other fields

Zurich is surrounded by airports that take business aircraft, and several of them are a better choice for particular trips, or the place your aircraft goes when Zurich has no room.

From the General Aviation Center to the city, the lakes and the mountains

Zurich is a short run into town and the start of a long one into the mountains. The times below are estimates for a car in normal traffic; the motorway around the city is slow at rush hour, and in winter the mountain roads can add considerably more.

The handler will have the car at the door of the General Aviation Center. For the Engadin the helicopter is the real choice in daylight, and a flight straight into Samedan the choice if your crew and aircraft are qualified for it. For Davos in Forum week, check the road restrictions before you commit to a drive.

Popular routes between the UK and Zurich, and which way they run empty

The third column is what an empty leg on that sector usually costs when an operator releases one. Chartering the same aircraft outright runs to a little under two and a half times that figure, and when a real sector is available the live board at the top of the page shows both.

The pattern has two halves. On the business corridors, Monday mornings and Thursday or Friday evenings are when aircraft reposition, because the passengers flew in for the week. In the ski season it turns into the Saturday changeover: a family flown out on Saturday leaves an aircraft with a week to fill, and rather than pay for a Zurich stand the operator takes it home and sends it back the following Saturday, empty in both directions.

Online calculator

If you want to see what your route would cost as a standard charter, so you have something to measure an empty leg against, use the calculator below. Fill in the airports, the dates and the number of passengers, add any preference on aircraft type, and we will send a written calculation by email or messenger. Please check your contact details carefully so that we can reply quickly.

The figure the calculator returns is an estimate for planning. The firm quote comes back from our consultants with the cost broken out line by line, and the price agreed there is the price written into the contract.

If you would rather skip the arithmetic, send us the route and the dates instead and a consultant will come back with both numbers, the charter price and any empty leg that fits.

Arriving in Zurich from the UK

Switzerland sits inside Schengen for passports and outside the European Union for everything else, so a Zurich arrival is a border crossing with Swiss customs rather than European ones.

• Passports. Switzerland checks passports by the Schengen book. Yours needs an issue date inside the last decade when you land, and at least three months of life left beyond your planned exit from the whole Schengen zone, whose 90 day allowance in any 180 days includes the time you spend in Switzerland.
• The Entry/Exit System. Swiss border posts use it like every other Schengen state, and it has been fully in force since 10 April 2026. A British traveller gives a facial image and fingerprints on the first crossing, after which the digital record replaces the passport stamp.
• ETIAS. Not in operation yet. Switzerland will require it along with the rest of Schengen, at 20 euros for three years or the life of the passport, but in July 2026 the launch was put back to 2027, with no firm date.
• What Swiss customs allow. Per person aged 17 or over and per day: five litres of wine, beer or anything else up to 18 per cent, one litre above that strength, and 250 cigarettes or 250 grams of other tobacco. On top of that, goods worth up to 150 francs in total come in free of VAT, a limit cut from 300 francs at the start of 2025; above it VAT is due on everything, not just the excess.
• Meat, milk and cheese. Animal products from Britain may not be brought into Switzerland, the exception being small quantities of sealed infant formula or special medical food, so leave the catering on board.
• Cash. There is no duty to declare cash on your own initiative, but if a customs officer asks whether you are carrying 10,000 francs or more, you must say so.
• Coming home. On a private arrival in Great Britain each adult may bring in 42 litres of beer, 18 litres of still wine and either 4 litres of spirits or 9 litres of sparkling or fortified wine free of duty, together with goods up to 270 GBP; from 1 October 2026 sparkling wine moves into the wine allowance and cider into the beer one. Meat and dairy from Switzerland are barred, as they are from the EU. Arrivals in Northern Ireland, Jersey or Guernsey fall under their own rules, and anyone not holding a British or Irish passport should check whether a UK electronic travel authorisation is needed.
• Taxes. Air Passenger Duty leaving Britain, nothing Swiss leaving Zurich, and a city tax or resort tax on each night in a hotel.

Empty leg calendar for Zurich, month by month

Zurich has two engines, business and skiing, and the strength of each in a given month decides how many sectors reach us and how cheap they are.

March, May, October and November give the best value. In January and December, book the charter early and treat an empty leg as a bonus; in February, watch the weekends, when the half term changeovers put aircraft on the move in both directions.

Three situations, three answers

Flying to Zurich with a dog or a cat

Switzerland applies the European rules to pets arriving from Britain. The animal needs a microchip, a rabies vaccination at least 21 days old and an animal health certificate from an official vet dated within ten days of the flight, and it must arrive through Basel, Geneva or Zurich, the only airports authorised to receive animals from outside the EU. A dog whose tail has been docked or whose ears have been cut is not normally admitted to Switzerland; a visitor who lives abroad can still bring one on holiday, against a deposit paid to customs at the border. The canton of Zurich also bans a list of breeds outright, including pit bull terriers, American Staffordshire terriers, Staffordshire bull terriers, bull terriers, several bully breeds and, since 1 January 2025, Rottweilers, together with any cross that is at least ten per cent one of them. Visitors from outside the canton may bring such a dog for no more than thirty days a year, always on a lead and muzzled in public places.

Plan the return first. The operator must be approved to carry animals into Great Britain on that route, and a dog must be treated for tapeworm by a vet between 24 and 120 hours before it lands. Zurich has vets used to the paperwork, and in the ski resorts the local practices know the drill too, but book the appointment when you book the flight. Say that an animal is travelling when you first contact us, so that sectors on aircraft which cannot carry it are filtered out from the start.

Questions about flying private to Zurich

Call +44 7857 574938 , message the same number on WhatsApp , or write to flight@empty-leg.co.uk . Give us the airports, your dates and how flexible they are, and the number of passengers, and we will reply with whatever sectors match together with the full charter price for comparison.