How flight delay is calculated: arrival time is what counts
At a glance
Your delay is measured on arrival at your final destination, and, according to the EU Court of Justice, the actual arrival time is the moment at least one of the aircraft doors opens so that passengers can leave the aircraft (judgment in Case C-452/13, Germanwings).
It is therefore neither the moment the wheels touch down on the runway nor the moment the aircraft stops at the gate that counts.
If you are three hours late or more when the door opens, you may be entitled to compensation under EU Regulation 261/2004, provided the flight is covered by the EU rules (departing from the EU/EEA, or arriving in the EU/EEA with an airline registered there) and the delay was not caused by extraordinary circumstances.
In this article
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Another flight problemThe door opening is the legal arrival time
The EU rules on air passenger rights tie compensation to how late you are, but the regulation does not define what "arrival time" actually means. The EU Court of Justice settled that in September 2014 in Case C-452/13 between the airline Germanwings and passenger Ronny Henning.
The Court's reasoning is easy to follow. As long as you remain on the aircraft, you are confined, under the airline's control and with very limited means of communicating with the outside world. Only when the doors open and you are able to disembark can you return to your normal activities. The Court therefore held that arrival time is the moment at which at least one of the aircraft doors opens, on the basis that passengers are then permitted to leave the aircraft.
The Court expressly rejected two other options: the moment the wheels touch down and the moment the aircraft reaches its parking position and the parking brake is applied.
Three moments on landing: today only one counts
- Touchdown: the wheels meet the runway. Does not count as arrival.
- On-block: the aircraft comes to a stop at its parking position and the brakes are applied. Does not count either.
- Door opening: at least one door opens and passengers are permitted to leave the aircraft. This is the legal arrival time according to the EU Court of Justice.
- Note: the time shown on airport screens and in apps may be the touchdown or on-block time, not when the door actually opened.
New rule on arrival time from 23 October 2027
This article describes the rules that apply until 22 October 2027. From 23 October 2027, Regulation (EU) 2026/2202, which amends Regulation 261/2004, applies. Under the new definition in Article 2(x), arrival time will then be the moment the aircraft reaches the arrival stand and its parking brakes are engaged (on-block time), no longer when the door opens. Under the new Article 6(4), the right to compensation applies when the delay at arrival at the final destination exceeds three hours.
Example: a few minutes that made the difference in the Germanwings case
On 11 May 2012, Ronny Henning flew from Salzburg to Cologne/Bonn with a scheduled arrival of 14:40. The aircraft touched down only at 17:38, a delay of 2 hours and 58 minutes. It reached its parking position at 17:43, that is 3 hours and 3 minutes behind schedule, and the doors opened shortly afterwards.
Germanwings argued that the touchdown time applied: 2 hours and 58 minutes, under the three-hour threshold, no compensation. Henning argued that the delay was more than three hours and claimed EUR 250. The Austrian first-instance court measured from the opening of the first door and ordered Germanwings to pay.
Germanwings appealed, and the appeal court, the Landesgericht Salzburg, asked the EU Court of Justice which moment counts. The Court answered: when at least one door opens, the same measure the first-instance court had used. Measured that way, the delay exceeded three hours. Deciding the dispute itself was then a matter for the Austrian court. A few minutes therefore separated no compensation from full compensation.
Departure delay and arrival delay are two different things
Article 6 of the regulation concerns delays at departure. It gives you a right to care at the airport (meals, refreshments and communication) when the departure is expected to be two, three or four hours late depending on the flight distance. After a delay of at least five hours, you may normally choose to abandon the journey and receive a refund of the ticket.
Financial compensation, by contrast, depends on when you arrive. Under the settled case-law of the EU Court of Justice, confirmed in the Germanwings judgment, passengers whose flight arrives three hours late or more may normally be entitled to compensation under Article 7, on the same basis as for cancelled flights.
This has two practical consequences. A late departure that the pilot makes up in the air normally gives no compensation if you still arrive less than three hours late. And, conversely, on connecting journeys booked as a single booking it is the arrival at the final destination that counts (Case C-11/11, Folkerts): a short delay on the first leg that causes you to miss the connection can mean many hours' delay to where you are actually going.
The compensation amounts in brief
The amount of compensation is governed first and foremost by the flight distance under Article 7 of the regulation. At the highest level, EUR 600 for flights over 3,500 km that are not within the EU/EEA, the amount may be halved where the arrival delay is less than four hours (Case C-402/07, Sturgeon).
| Flight distance | Compensation level |
|---|---|
| Flights up to 1,500 km | €250 |
| 1,500–3,500 km (and longer intra-EU flights) | €400 |
| Flights over 3,500 km | €600 |
The amounts apply per passenger.
The airline may halve the amount if it offers rerouting that arrives no more than 2 hours (up to 1,500 km), 3 hours (1,500–3,500 km and longer intra-EU flights) or 4 hours (other flights over 3,500 km) after the original arrival time (Article 7(2)). For a delay on a flight over 3,500 km to or from a country outside the EU, the amount may also be halved if you arrive at least three but less than four hours late (Court of Justice, Sturgeon and Others, paragraph 63).
Three hours at the door is not always enough
Even where the delay passes three hours when the door opens, the airline may be relieved of paying compensation if it can prove that the delay was caused by extraordinary circumstances which could not have been avoided even if all reasonable measures had been taken, for example weather conditions incompatible with operating the flight. The right to care at the airport is not affected by this, however.
And in the other direction: if the door opens before three hours have passed, no compensation is normally due, even where the departure was delayed considerably more than that.
How to document the actual arrival time
Straight away on arrival
- Take a photo when the door opens or as you disembark: the time is saved in the image metadata
- Send a message to someone as you leave the aircraft, giving you an independent timestamp
- Note down yourself when the aircraft landed and when it came to a stop, if you have time
Afterwards
- Keep your boarding pass, booking confirmation and any text messages from the airline
- Retrieve flight data from a flight-tracking service: this often shows both the landing time and the on-block time
- Request written confirmation from the airline of the actual arrival time
Common questions about arrival time
Yes. The delay runs until the door opens and you are permitted to disembark. Time the aircraft spends waiting on the runway or at a parking position is therefore included, and it may be what takes the delay past the three-hour threshold.
The airline's figure may be based on the touchdown or on-block time, which can be several minutes before the door opening. Under the current rules, it is the door opening that applies in law. Your own documentation with timestamps can be very helpful in borderline cases.
It does, but for other rights. A delayed departure gives a right to care such as meals and refreshments under Article 6, and after at least five hours normally a refund of the ticket. Financial compensation, however, is assessed on your arrival at your final destination.
The airline has its own records of the arrival, but you rarely get to see them directly. Combine your own documentation with public flight data, and where a case is close to the threshold, you can ask the airline for its records of when the door opened.
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Another flight problemShow all 6 sources
Every factual statement in this article rests on one of the sources below: EU regulations, judgments of the EU Court of Justice and the authorities' own pages.
Sources
- Judgment in Case C-452/13, Germanwings GmbH v Ronny Henning (4 September 2014) · Court of Justice of the European Union via EUR-Lex · Case law · retrieved 2026-07-04
- Regulation (EC) No 261/2004 of the European Parliament and of the Council, Articles 2(h), 3(1), 5(3), 6 and 7 and recital 14 · EUR-Lex · Regulation · retrieved 2026-10-06
- Judgment in Joined Cases C-402/07 and C-432/07, Sturgeon and Others v Condor Flugdienst GmbH and Böck and Lepuschitz v Air France SA (Fourth Chamber, 19 November 2009) · Court of Justice of the European Union via EUR-Lex · Case law · retrieved 2026-10-06
- Judgment in Case C-11/11, Air France SA v Heinz-Gerke Folkerts and Luz-Tereza Folkerts (Grand Chamber, 26 February 2013) · Court of Justice of the European Union via EUR-Lex · Case law · retrieved 2026-10-06
- Judgment in Case C-537/17, Claudia Wegener v Royal Air Maroc SA (Eighth Chamber, 31 May 2018) · Court of Justice of the European Union via EUR-Lex · Case law · retrieved 2026-10-06
- Regulation (EU) 2026/2202 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 16 September 2026 amending Regulation (EC) No 261/2004 and Council Regulation (EC) No 2027/97 (OJ L, 2.10.2026) · EUR-Lex · Regulation · retrieved 2026-10-06