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Elon Musk Is One of 2024’s Top Celebrity Private Fliers

But Musk’s Gulfstreams came in second on the list of celebrity jets that flew the most miles this year. He had stiff competition from Kim Kardashian, Bill Gates, Sean “Diddy” Combs, and Travis Scott.
January 19, 2025
Business jet red carpet
High-net worth clients have largely remained in business aviation since Covid, while the sector has also seen a return of corporate travelers.
Getty Images.

Celebrities who flew their private jets in 2024 have been largely covered by the media. So it comes as no surprise that the celebrities and tech moguls whose aircraft flew the most include Kim Kardashian, Travis Scott, Bill Gates, and Sean Combs. But the most famous private flier has to be the world’s wealthiest individual, Elon Musk, whose personal efforts and funds to promote Donald Trump’s 2024 bid for the presidency put him under the public spotlight for most of the year.

During the election, Musk’s Gulfstream G650s were his primary means of transport. The private jets made 355 trips in 2024, with 31 of those to or from Palm Beach, where Trump’s Mar-a-Lago is located. The first Palm Beach trip took place on February 17, according to Business Insider, which used data from jetspy.com to track the Tesla CEO’s jets. Several months later, The Wall Street Journal reported that the Trump and Musk discussed the possible roles the X owner might have in the incoming president’s new administration.

During the campaign, Musk’s planes made 13 trips to and from swing states, where he campaigned for Trump, and 10 flights to and from the Washington, D.C. area. Since the election, the SpaceX founder has made 25 flights to and from Palm Beach, Business Insider reported. It’s unclear if all of these trips were to visit Mar-a-Lago, and if Musk was actually on board the jets for each trip.

Business jets ready for takeoff.
Getty Images.

The Gulfstream’s top destinations this year also included airports in Hawthorne, California, and Brownsville, Texas, according to the publication. Both are near SpaceX sites. The jets also took off and landed at an airport in Austin, where Musk has a home and where Tesla’s headquarters are located. The analysis also showed international flights to France, Poland, Germany, Portugal, Indonesia, China, and the U.K. Musk visited Paris last summer for the Olympics and recently for the reopening of Notre-Dame. The jetspy data, according to Business Insider, showed that the two jets used about $2.5 million worth of fuel in 2024, while emitting nearly 4,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide.

But Musk wasn’t the top celebrity flier, according to CEO Today Magazine. Former Google CEO Eric Schmidt’s Gulfstream G650 has made 493 flights this year, the website reported, using data from CelebrityPrivateJetTracker.com, placing him at No. 1. The trips covered about 612,578 miles and the data tracker estimates that about 735,790 gallons of fuel were used. Kim Kardashian’s aircraft, meanwhile, made 236 flights in 2024, traveling about 419,532 miles. Sean “Diddy” Combs’s private jet, before his legal problems, made 320 flights in 2024, while rapper Travis Scott’s aircraft made 308 flights. Bill Gates’s Gulfstream G650 also reportedly made 273 flights this year, consuming 478,920 gallons of fuel.

This article originally appeared in Robb Report US.

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