RentJet has launched Empty Legs Radar (@emptylegsradar_bot) — a free Telegram bot that tracks private jet empty leg flights for a specific route and a specific date range, and messages you the moment a matching flight is listed. It checks operator listings every 10 minutes, never repeats an alert, shows per-seat and whole-aircraft prices, and links straight to the request page. No app, no account: open the bot, send /track, pick your cities and dates.
Empty legs are the best-priced seats in private aviation and the hardest to catch: a good one is listed and gone within hours, usually while you are not looking. Until now the only options were refreshing aggregator sites or reading a firehose channel of every flight in the world. Today we are launching a third way — a Telegram bot that watches your route, for your dates, and tells you the moment something appears. It is called Empty Legs Radar, it is free, and to our knowledge it is the first bot of its kind.
Key Takeaways
- Track up to 5 routes at once, each with its own date range — 'Dubai → London, 15–30 October' — and get a private message within minutes of a matching empty leg being listed
- Anywhere mode: track 'Dubai → Anywhere' and hear about everything leaving your city, whatever the destination
- Exact dates without typos: pick the year, then the month, then the day — from and to — with buttons; presets like 'Next 7 days' and 'This month' for the impatient
- Every alert carries the full flight: both cities, the departure date and local time, the aircraft, the per-seat price and the whole-aircraft price when both are offered, and a one-tap link to request it
- The engine checks live operator listings every 10 minutes, de-duplicates them so one flight is one alert, converts departure times to airport local time, and hides flights that are too close to departure to book
- Smart about city names: 'Milan' matches Linate and Malpensa, 'Prague' matches Praha, and a typo like 'Dubay' gets a 'did you mean' button instead of a dead end
- No account, no email, no app: it lives in Telegram, pauses with /stop, and every step has a Menu button that safely discards a half-finished request
- Built by RentJet — the same team that answers your request on WhatsApp — and free for everyone, not only our clients
Comparison at a Glance
| How you look for empty legs | Coverage | Only your route & dates | Effort | Typical delay |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Refreshing aggregator websites | Partial, often stale | No | Daily | Hours to days |
| Broker email lists | One broker's inventory | No | Reading every email | Same day |
| @emptylegsradar Telegram channel | Every listed flight worldwide | No | Reading the channel | Minutes |
| Empty Legs Radar bot | Every listed flight worldwide | Yes | Set once | Minutes |
The problem with finding an empty leg
An empty leg is a repositioning flight: the aircraft has to move from A to B anyway, so the operator sells it at a fraction of the normal charter price. The catch is timing. These flights are created by someone else's booking, they appear at odd hours, and the good ones are requested within a few hours of being listed. If you happen to look at the right page at the right moment, you win. If not, you never knew it existed.
Most travellers who want empty legs do one of two things. They bookmark a few aggregator websites and check them when they remember to — which means they see flights that sold days ago and miss the ones listed this morning. Or they join a channel that posts every empty leg in the world, and after a week of two hundred flights from Johannesburg and Genoa they mute it.
Neither approach answers the only question that matters: is there a flight on my route, on my dates, right now?
What Empty Legs Radar does
@emptylegsradar_bot is a Telegram bot with one job. You tell it a route and a period; it watches the live listings and sends you a private message the moment a matching flight appears. It keeps watching until your dates pass, then switches that subscription off by itself.
You can track up to five routes at the same time, each with its own dates. A typical list looks like this:
- Dubai → London · 15 Oct 2026 – 30 Oct 2026
- London → Dubai · 1 Nov 2026 – 10 Nov 2026
- Dubai → Anywhere · any dates
The last one is Anywhere mode: you get every empty leg leaving your city, whatever the destination. It is surprisingly useful — an unexpected Maldives or Nice flight at a fraction of the price is exactly the kind of trip people say yes to.
How it works, step by step
1. Open the bot and send /track
Open t.me/emptylegsradar_bot, press Start, answer a one-tap verification (it keeps spam bots out), and send /track — or tap "Track a route" in the menu.
2. Pick the departure and destination
The bot shows buttons for popular cities — Dubai, Abu Dhabi, London, Paris, Riyadh, Maldives, Milan, Geneva and others — plus "Other city" for anything else. You can also simply type the city name at any step. The matching is forgiving: "Milan" covers Linate and Malpensa, "Prague" covers Praha, and if you type "Dubay" you get a "Did you mean Dubai?" button rather than an error. Any city with an airport works, even if there is no flight listed today.
3. Choose the dates
Quick presets cover the common cases: any dates, next 7 days, next 30 days, this month, next month. For an exact period, tap "Exact dates" and choose the year, then the month, then the day for the start, and again for the end. The picker only offers valid options — you cannot select yesterday, or an end date before the start — so there is nothing to mistype. A "Back" button steps through the choices, and "Menu" discards the half-finished request cleanly.
4. Get the alert
When a matching flight is listed, you receive a message within minutes. It contains everything you need to decide:
- both cities and the exact departure date, with the departure time in the airport's local time;
- the aircraft category and model;
- the per-seat price and the whole-aircraft price, whenever both are offered;
- a "Request this flight" link to the flight page on rentjet.ae, where one button sends your request to our team on WhatsApp.
Empty legs are first-come, first-served, so the message also reminds you to request early.
Under the hood
The bot is the visible part of a pipeline that runs around the clock on our servers:
- Every 10 minutes the engine pulls the live empty leg listings from our aviation partners — 144 checks a day.
- De-duplication. Operators often list the same physical flight twice, once by the seat and once as a whole aircraft. The engine folds those into one record, so one flight means one alert, never two.
- Local time. Departure times are converted to the departure airport's time zone, so "09:30" means 09:30 where the aircraft actually is.
- Cut-off. Flights within a few hours of departure are removed from the site and are not sent as alerts — there is no realistic way to book them anymore.
- One flight, one message. Every alert is recorded per user and per flight, so a restart, a network hiccup or a re-listed flight never produces a duplicate.
The same snapshot powers the live counters on our empty legs page and the @emptylegsradar channel, where every new flight worldwide is posted publicly.
Channel or bot?
Both, ideally. The channel is for browsing: every new empty leg in the world, posted as it appears, with a picture and the price. The bot is for waiting: it stays silent until something matches your route and your dates, and then it speaks. Most of our clients follow the channel for inspiration and use the bot for the trip they actually need to take.
Why we built it — and why it is free
RentJet arranges private charters from Dubai and worldwide, and empty legs are a real part of that business. But the honest truth is that most people who ask us for an empty leg are asking at the wrong moment: the flight they wanted existed three days ago. The bot fixes the timing problem for everyone, not just our clients, and that is why there is no sign-up, no fee and no catch. If an alert leads to a request, you talk to our team on WhatsApp and we handle the operator, the confirmation and the details — as with any other charter.
As far as we know, Empty Legs Radar is the first Telegram bot built specifically to track empty legs by route and date range with private alerts. It is also the first project of its kind from a UAE charter company. We intend to keep it ahead: more platforms and more sources are on the roadmap, and the bot has a /feedback command that sends your message or screenshot straight to the team.
Get started
- Open @emptylegsradar_bot in Telegram and press Start.
- Send
/track, pick your cities, pick your dates. - Wait. When a matching flight appears, you will be the first to know.
The full product page with screenshots is at rentjet.ae/emptylegsradar_app. Current flights are always listed on the empty legs deals page.
“I built Empty Legs Radar because I kept watching good flights disappear before anyone who actually needed them had a chance to see them. The problem was never a shortage of empty legs — it was that nobody could sit and refresh a page all day. A bot can. Tell it your route and your dates once, and let the deals find you.”
Frequently Asked Questions
Is Empty Legs Radar free?
Yes. Tracking and alerts are free for everyone. You only pay if you decide to book a flight, and that is a normal charter transaction with RentJet.
How many routes can I track?
Up to 5 at the same time, each with its own date range. Expired subscriptions switch off automatically.
How fast are the alerts?
The engine checks the live listings every 10 minutes, so a new flight reaches you within minutes of being listed.
Does the city need to be in the bot's list?
No. The buttons show popular cities, but you can type any city with an airport — even one with no flights today. You will be alerted when the first one appears.
What does 'Anywhere' mean?
You will be alerted about every empty leg departing from the city you chose, regardless of destination.
How do I book a flight from an alert?
Tap the link in the message to open the flight page, then 'Request This Flight'. Your request goes to our team on WhatsApp and we confirm availability and the final price with the operator.
Can I pause the bot?
Send /stop to pause and /resume to continue. Your routes stay saved. Every step also has a Menu button that discards a half-finished request.
Pavel Bukreev
Pavel Bukreev is the founder of RentJet and the author of the Empty Legs Radar concept — a Telegram bot that watches private jet repositioning flights for a traveller's exact route and dates. He writes about private aviation from the client's side of the table: what actually works, what is oversold, and how to get the most out of every flight.