How to Track a Flight's Live Status at Heathrow Airport

The fastest way to check a live flight at Heathrow is heathrow.com/arrivals or heathrow.com/departures, Heathrow's own status pages, updated minute by minute with no booking reference needed. For extra detail once you're travelling, the Heathrow app adds check-in zone, bag drop, security wait times and gate information for departures, and baggage reclaim and immigration wait times for arrivals. Third-party trackers such as Flightradar24 are useful for watching an aircraft's live position in the air, but Heathrow's own pages are the better source for gate numbers, terminal information and whether a flight is delayed or cancelled. Checked November 2026.

Checking a flight without an app or account

Heathrow's own live status pages don't require a login, a booking reference, or the app. Go to heathrow.com/arrivals for inbound flights or heathrow.com/departures for outbound ones, and search by flight number, airline, or destination/origin. Each listing shows the scheduled and estimated or actual time, status (on time, delayed, boarding, landed), and, closer to the time, the terminal and gate. This is the quickest option if you just want to know whether someone's flight has landed, or whether your own departure is running on time, without installing anything.

What the Heathrow app adds

The Heathrow app goes further than the status pages once you add a specific flight to it, and the detail differs depending on whether you're departing, arriving or connecting:

• Departing: check-in zone, bag drop information, security wait times, gate information, and boarding updates as they happen.
• Arriving: baggage reclaim belt information, immigration wait times (where available), and options for onward travel.
• Connecting: add your inbound flight as well as your onward one, so you can track both legs in one place.

This is worth having if you're actually travelling through Heathrow that day, since it surfaces information the public status pages don't, such as live security queue times. It's less necessary if you simply want to check whether a specific flight has landed from outside the airport. See our full review of what the Heathrow app does for whether it's worth downloading for your trip.

Third-party flight trackers

Sites and apps such as Flightradar24 and FlightAware pull live position data from aircraft transponders, so they're the best option if you want to watch an aircraft's actual route and altitude in real time, or see how far out an inbound flight still is. They're generally very good for position and estimated landing time, but they aren't Heathrow's own source for terminal, gate or ground-operations information, so cross-check with heathrow.com/arrivals or heathrow.com/departures for anything affecting what happens once the aircraft is on the ground, such as terminal and gate.

Checking a flight by airline instead

Most airlines also publish their own flight status tool, usually more reliable than a third-party aggregator for airline-specific details such as check-in deadlines, baggage allowances tied to your fare, or rebooking options if a flight is cancelled. If you're meeting someone or need to make a decision based on a delay, such as whether to leave for the airport yet, Heathrow's own arrivals page and the airline's app will usually agree, but the airline's own tool is the one to use if you need to act on the booking itself, such as rebooking.

When flight status pages update

Heathrow's status pages and app update close to real time, but the "estimated" time shown for an inbound flight can still shift, particularly for long-haul arrivals, since it's based on the aircraft's current position and speed rather than a fixed schedule. Treat the estimated time as a planning guide and build in some margin if you're timing a pick-up around it; see our guide to arrivals meeting points for where to wait once you know roughly when to expect someone.

Quick reference: which tool for which job