Chase Sapphire Lounge (Etihad) JFK Review: Great Food, Small Space

Worth Coming to Airport Early For: YES (ONLY if you’re visiting in the morning / lunchtime; good luck getting in during peak departure banks)

Better Than The Terminal? YES (Terminal 4 itself at JFK isn’t that nice, but there’s an absurd concentration of premium lounges here…including this one)

Introduction

Terminal 4 at JFK is weird. It’s strangely become one of the densest lounge hotspots at any US airport. Maybe the best? Terminal 4 itself is fine but nothing special. It’s functionally Delta’s terminal, but also serves a decent-sized list of international airlines (and some are quite unique … like Uzbekistan Airways & Kenya Airways. Maybe I’ll try them someday). It’s a bit of a dated and bland terminal. Security definitely needs a redesign (why is 95% of the space check-in kiosks and then 2 security lines are crammed in the back using 5% of the space???). Anyways. Onto the the Chase Sapphire Lounge here.

In this post, you’ll find:

A Brief History of This Lounge & Etihad Involvement

This lounge has a strange history. What you’ll have already noticed is that this is not a pure Chase Lounge. In fact, it’s more of an Etihad lounge than anything.

Originally, this lounge was 100% dedicated to Etihad with zero Chase involvement. This is back in the heyday of Etihad, when the airline was trying to become the ultimate luxury airline (competing with Emirates, Qatar, etc) catering towards its first and business class passengers with its Residence suite and showers etc.

Post-COVID the airline became a lot more interested in making money, and it didn’t make a ton of sense financially to have this expensive prime JFK property with just ~two~ flights to Abu Dhabi per day. This meant the lounge just sat empty most of the time with poor space utilization. In 2024, the lounge re-launched as the “Chase Sapphire Lounge by The Club with Etihad Airways”. Rolls off the tongue?

The idea here was that Etihad could share some of the economics with Chase to better utilize the space. While the lounge was underutilized as an Etihad-only premium lounge, it now has the opposite problem: very severe overcrowding. This is especially bad during peak Etihad departure banks, when their first / business class passengers get priority access (ahead of Chase Sapphire Reserve cardholders) to the lounge. Etihad currently operates two flights to Abu Dhabi per day (EY2 / EY4), the first at 3:45pm and the second at 10:20pm. Throw in the fact that seemingly half of NYC yuppies have this card and then factor in the 3pm+ transatlantic departure rush in T4, and you have probably 1,000+ eligible people daily for a lounge that’s relatively small.

General rule of thumb on timing: if you’re coming to this lounge with the Chase Sapphire Reserve card (yes, the one you pay $795/year for) after ~2pm, it’s likely you’ll have to wait 1+ hour, or you won’t be able to get in at all. I’ve been to JFK T4 multiple times around 4pm-8pm, and each time there’s been a huge line + waitlist. Luxury for the everyone? I honestly wouldn’t even bother with this lounge if you’re coming in the afternoon or evening. Mornings are the sweet spot. Sure you might get lucky, but it’s not worth the stress / gamble. Unless you are flying Etihad J, of course.

Lounge Access Rules and Where To Find It

This lounge is extremely easy to find: just walk left after security and it’s right there on the same level. Coincidentally, this lounge is literally right next to the Amex Centurion lounge, which is the same exact setup as LaGuardia airport (see my review of the LGA Chase lounge here – very different experience than JFK. I love that lounge).

You’ll be able to tell pretty quickly if there’s a wait or not – this was actually my first time ever at JFK T4 when there wasn’t a horde of people waiting to get in (same goes for the Amex lounge). My flight was at 11am and I rolled up here at ~9:30AM or so.

There are two primary ways to get into this lounge:

1. Chase Sapphire Reserve card. This card goes for $795/year with a bunch of credits you can (theoretically) offset the burden with. You can bring up to two guests for free if you’re the primary cardholder (this is currently the most generous policy vs Amex and Capital One. We’ll see how long this lasts…)
2. Priority Pass. This one is weird, and it’s how I got in. Technically with priority pass select (i.e the standard membership granted through premium travel cards like the Amex Platinum or Venture X), you get one complimentary access to Chase lounges per year. This is actually a pretty brilliant marketing tactic if to get exposure to their (very nice) lounge network to try and convince you to get their card.

This lounge is open from 5am – 11pm daily, and you must be departing from terminal 4 with a departure time within 3 hours (enforcement varies by desk agent here but I wouldn’t gamble it).

Lounge Amenities & Review

On to the lounge itself. This property is pretty small at just ~7,600 square feet. Here’s the entrance to the space:

Everything in this lounge feels super premium & polished. Whoever is designing Chase lounges in general deserves a raise – all their spaces are great.

The lounge was empty enough in the morning where they let me choose a seat; the last time I visited seating was “assigned”, where the agent walked you to your assigned table (the lounge was at 100% capacity then).

The centerpiece of the lounge is this bar:

Unsurprisingly, it was pretty empty in the morning (on a Monday) but I’m sure it gets packed at the bar later in the day.

Here’s the central room of the lounge:

Moving further into the lounge, there’s a snack / coffee bar on the side of the main room:

The lounge comes stocked with Joe Coffee across their machines / cold brew:

Further down the hallway, you’ll find the main hot food bar. Here there are lots of small, high-quality plates:

Food quality (even for breakfast) was extremely strong when I visited. They had fancy french toast, some sort of shakshouka dish, avocado & lox toast, etc.

Note that each table also comes with its QR code if you prefer to order directly from the kitchen for table service (I did both). Here’s what the menu looked like in the morning:

I opted for the “Sapphire sunrise melt”, which ended up being really good:

Now on to the rest of the lounge. Past the hot food bar is a long hallway with quieter seating options than the main area:

And last but not least, quick bathroom check. It was fine.

Conclusion

Overall, I was really impressed by my visit to this lounge. Chase is leading (along with Capital One) the premium bank-run lounge game (Amex needs to step it up). The big caveat with this lounge is that it’s way too small for a prime JFK location with so many eligible people, so I’d only carve out extra time if visiting in the mornings when it’s quieter. If flying during peak departure banks in the afternoon / evening, it’s a gamble if you’ll have to wait 1 hour+, if you’re able to even get in at all.