There are lots of great smartphone apps for travelers, but our favorite is the Mobile Passport Control app. It’s the app that lets you breeze through immigration when you return to the US after an international trip!
You’ve probably already pulled out your smartphone a thousand times during the course of your trip. You’ve used it to snap photos and record videos. You’ve called cabs and made hotel reservations on it. You’ve researched restaurant reviews and the opening times of museums. You’ve whiled away the time on the flight home using your e-Reader app and playing a round or two (or twenty) of Candy Crush. But once you land in the US, if you are at an airport that offers Mobile Passport Control, you’ll be glad to whip out your smartphone one more time to expedite your re-entry to the US.
The Mobile Passport Control app is a free application you can download onto your iPhone, iPad, or Android device. When you arrive at a US port that uses Mobile Passport Control, you just open your app and enter some details about yourself and your trip. You can then go through a “fast lane” rather than standing in the long lines for Customs and Border Control.
Mobile Passport Control first debuted at Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport in August 2014, and has been added to more and more airports since then. Most recently, the Mobile Passport Control lanes were added at the international airports in Denver, Orlando, Minneapolis-St. Paul, and San Jose, California. There are currently thirteen airports in the US that use Mobile Passport Control. Officials say there will be twenty airports offering the service by the end of 2016. The airports that now offer Mobile Passport Control are:
- Atlanta Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport (ATL)
- Chicago O’Hare International Airport (ORD)
- Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport (DFW)
- Denver International Airport (DEN)
- Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport (FLL)
- Miami International Airport (MIA)
- Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport (MSP)
- Newark International Airport (EWR)
- New York John F. Kennedy International Airport (JFK)
- Orlando International Airport (MCO)
- San Francisco International Airport (SFO)
- San Jose International Airport (SJC)
- Seattle-Tacoma International Airport (SEA)
The latest development is that Mobile Passport Control is coming to cruise terminals, too! Port Everglades in Fort Lauderdale, FL will be the first cruise port in the US to offer Mobile Passport Control. They plan to launch the service in late July 2016.
What are you waiting for? Grab your passport and your smartphone and get traveling!