Conor McGregor’s Private Jet: The $49M Aircraft He Doesn’t Own

No athlete on earth has posted more private jet content than Conor McGregor. The staircase shot, the cabin walkthrough, the black SUVs waiting on the ramp: it is a genre he more or less invented.

Here is the part almost nobody gets right. There is no Conor McGregor private jet. Every aircraft in those photographs belongs to somebody else, rented by the hour, and handed back when the trip ends.

This article covers the aircraft he has actually flown, from a 19-seat Embraer Lineage 1000 to a Gulfstream G550, the false ownership claim that keeps circulating, the real cost of flying the way he flies, and why renting is the smarter move for a fighter who competes once a year at best.

Does Conor McGregor Own a Private Jet?

No. Despite a decade of jet photography, no aircraft has ever been publicly tied to McGregor as owner, and Irish and UK reporting consistently describes him as renting rather than owning.

He does something cleverer than owning. He charters aircraft near the top of the market, brands them in his captions as “Mac Air” or “Notorious Airways,” and lets the internet assume the rest.

It also means he has quietly avoided the fate of Taylor Swift’s private jet, which became a running news story only because a fixed tail number could be tracked flight by flight.

McGregor’s flying leaves no such trail. Rent a different airframe every trip and there is nothing for a tracking account to follow.

Conor McGregor’s Private Jet Fleet: What He Actually Flies

Five aircraft account for almost every McGregor jet photograph in circulation. All five were chartered, and the list is a decent tour of the top end of the charter market.

Put that fleet next to the ones in the rest of this series and the contrast is stark. Floyd Mayweather’s private jets include a Gulfstream G650 and a Gulfstream III he has owned outright at the same time.

McGregor has flown comparable metal and paid for none of it beyond the hours he used. Among athletes with private jets, he is the most visible non-owner in the sport.

The Cessna Citation Claim That Will Not Die

Search for McGregor’s jet and you will hit the same paragraph on a dozen aggregator sites: he owns a Cessna 560XL Citation Excel registered G-CGMF, worth somewhere between $15 million and $30 million.

Three things are wrong with it.

The likeliest explanation is mundane. McGregor chartered a Citation Excel at some point, was photographed beside it, and a caption became a fact.

That is how most celebrity jet ownership claims are born, and it is why tail numbers matter more than photographs.

The Origin Story: How McGregor Became Aviation’s Loudest Renter

The pattern was set early, and it has barely changed in ten years: rent the biggest aircraft available, film the walk to the airstair, post it before wheels up.

That last entry matters more to this story than it looks. A fighter who has competed a handful of times in a decade generates very few fight-related flights, and a long injury layoff generates fewer still.

Inside the Embraer Lineage 1000

The Lineage 1000 is the most interesting aircraft in the McGregor story, because it is not really a business jet at all. It is a converted Embraer 190 regional airliner with the seats taken out.

Embraer built fewer than 30 of them, which makes it a genuinely rare charter option. The one McGregor flew belongs to Union Aviation, a Latvian operator based at Riga, whose Lineage fleet is offered across Europe and the Gulf.

The airliner fuselage buys space that no purpose-built business jet in this price class can match. Five separate zones, a lounge, an office, a widescreen television and enough floor area to lay out nine beds.

What it does not buy is reach. At 4,590 NM the Lineage is short-legged next to the ultra-long-range jets in this series, which is why Dublin to Dubai suits it and Dublin to Los Angeles does not.

That trade of range for volume is common to the whole airliner-conversion category, which also produces the biggest private jets in service. It also explains why so many converted airliners carry private jet bedrooms that a Gulfstream simply has no room for.

The Gulfstream G550 He Called a Bullet

The 2022 arrival photos are the ones most people picture when they think of the McGregor jet: a Gulfstream G550 on an Irish ramp, a Cadillac Escalade and a GMC Yukon Denali waiting at the nose.

The G550 is the opposite aircraft to the Lineage. Narrower cabin, far greater reach, and one of the fastest business jets ever certified at a maximum cruise of Mach 0.885.

Gulfstream ended G550 production in 2021 after building more than 600, and the type still anchors the top of the used market. It is a regular on lists of the longest range private jets despite being a design that first flew in the 1990s.

Notorious Airways: The 32-Seat Charter Stunt

In August 2017, in the build-up to the Mayweather fight, McGregor and betting sponsor Betsafe chartered a 32-seat VIP airliner, wrapped it in his face, and called it Notorious Airways.

The passenger list was a marketing department’s dream: competition winners, two Straight Blast Gym teammates, fighters Tony Bellew and Jimi Manuwa, and boxing promoter Eddie Hearn.

McGregor recorded a custom pre-flight safety briefing for the cabin, delivered entirely in character. It remains the single most effective piece of private aviation marketing any fighter has produced.

The operator was never publicly confirmed, and the aircraft type has never been verified either. Charter-industry accounts have pointed to an Airbus A318 corporate shuttle, which would fit the 32-seat figure exactly, but no operator has ever put its name to the flight.

What is certain is that it was a charter, booked for one round trip, and that the aircraft went back to work under someone else’s branding the following week.

The Charter Math: Why Renting Beats Owning for McGregor

Owning a jet is not really a purchase decision, it is a utilisation decision. The industry rule of thumb is that ownership starts making financial sense somewhere around 200 to 400 flight hours a year.

Below that threshold you are paying crew salaries, hangarage, insurance, and engine programme fees to keep an aircraft idle. A Gulfstream G550 carries roughly $1 million a year in fixed costs before a drop of fuel is burned.

Aircraft McGregor has flown	Range	Passengers	Typical charter rate
Embraer Lineage 1000	4,590 NM	Up to 19	~$18,000 to $20,000/hr
Gulfstream G550	6,750 NM	Up to 19	~$13,000 to $16,000/hr
Bombardier Global Express XRS	6,150 NM	Up to 14	€8,900/hr as reported
Bombardier Global 5000	5,200 NM	Up to 13	~$12,000 to $14,000/hr
Cessna Citation XLS	1,858 NM	Up to 9	~$4,000 to $5,000/hr

Now apply McGregor’s actual schedule. He has fought four times since 2016, and his 2026 comeback lasted 69 seconds before a knee injury put him out for most of a year.

Even generously counting holidays, promotional appearances and business travel, that is nowhere near the flight hours an owned G550 would need to justify itself.

The same logic drives the discount end of the market. Repositioning flights, where an aircraft has to fly somewhere empty to reach its next booking, are sold as private jet empty legs at a fraction of the full charter rate.

Carbon, Criticism, and the Absent Data

Celebrity jet emissions reporting depends entirely on flight tracking, and flight tracking depends on a fixed tail number tied to a named owner. McGregor supplies neither.

That is why he has never appeared in the annual celebrity emissions tables that have repeatedly caught Taylor Swift, Kylie Jenner and Drake. There is no dataset to put him in.

The contrast with Lewis Hamilton’s private jet is instructive. Hamilton owned an aircraft, got tracked, took the criticism, and eventually sold it.

McGregor never owned one, never got tracked, and has taken almost no aviation criticism at all despite flying larger aircraft than Hamilton ever did.

Conor McGregor’s Most Famous Private Jet Moments

The Notorious Airways safety video, August 2017

Thirty-two passengers, a Vegas-bound charter, and a pre-flight briefing delivered by the main event himself. The clip travelled further than the flight did.

The Gulfstream G550 homecoming, 2022

The definitive McGregor jet image. A G550 parked on an Irish ramp, two black American SUVs at the nose, and a caption announcing he was home.

Dominating Irish skies at Dublin Airport

Photographed beside a hired Bombardier Global Express XRS before a run to Nice, McGregor claimed the Irish skies as his own. Irish media promptly published the aircraft’s €8,900 hourly rate.

Dublin to Dubai on the Lineage 1000, 2025

Cameras followed him from the car door to the airstair of a 19-seat converted airliner ahead of Bare Knuckle Fighting Championship’s Middle East debut. It was the biggest aircraft he had been filmed boarding in eight years.

The White House trip, March 2025

McGregor flew to Washington for a St. Patrick’s Day visit to the White House, appearing in the briefing room alongside the press secretary. The travel arrangements were, as ever, chartered.

How McGregor Compares to Other Celebrity Jet Owners

Set against the rest of this series, McGregor is the outlier: the loudest aviation presence with the smallest aviation balance sheet.

Athlete	Owns an aircraft?	Flagship jet
Conor McGregor	No, charters only	Embraer Lineage 1000 (rented)
Floyd Mayweather	Yes, several	Gulfstream G650
Michael Jordan	Yes	Gulfstream G550, N236MJ
Tiger Woods	Yes	Gulfstream G550, N517TW
LeBron James	Yes	Gulfstream G280
Lewis Hamilton	No, sold in 2019	Bombardier Challenger 605 (former)

Both Michael Jordan’s private jets and LeBron James’ private jet carry registrations chosen for their initials, because owners get to personalise their aircraft.

McGregor personalises his differently. He does it with a caption, a vinyl wrap for a weekend, and a camera crew, and it has bought him more aviation fame than any of them.

FAQ

Does Conor McGregor own a private jet?

No. Conor McGregor does not own a private jet. He charters aircraft by the hour from commercial operators and brands them in his social posts as “Mac Air” or “Notorious Airways.” No aircraft registration has ever been publicly tied to him as owner, which is why he never appears in celebrity flight-tracking data.

What private jet does Conor McGregor fly?

He has been publicly filmed or photographed with an Embraer Lineage 1000 operated by Union Aviation, a Gulfstream G550, a Bombardier Global Express XRS, a Bombardier Global 5000, and a 32-seat VIP airliner chartered for the 2017 Notorious Airways promotion. All were charters.

What is Conor McGregor's biggest private jet?

The Embraer Lineage 1000 he chartered from Union Aviation for a Dublin to Dubai flight in 2025. It is a converted Embraer 190 regional airliner with five cabin zones, up to 19 seats, space for nine full-size beds, and a range of 4,590 NM (8,500 km) with five passengers aboard.

Does Conor McGregor own the jet called Notorious Airways?

No. Notorious Airways was a one-off 2017 marketing campaign with betting sponsor Betsafe. A 32-seat VIP airliner was chartered to fly competition winners, teammates and guests to Las Vegas for the Floyd Mayweather fight, wrapped in McGregor branding for the trip. The operator was never publicly confirmed.

Is it true Conor McGregor owns a Cessna Citation registered G-CGMF?

No, and the claim does not survive scrutiny. A 2002-build Cessna 560XL Citation Excel trades in the low single-digit millions rather than the $15 million to $30 million widely quoted, it seats eight or nine passengers rather than the 32 the same articles describe, and the G- prefix denotes a United Kingdom registration held by a charter operator.

How much does it cost Conor McGregor to fly private?

Irish media reported a Bombardier Global Express XRS he chartered at Dublin Airport at €8,900 per hour. Typical market rates for the other types he has flown run from roughly $12,000 to $16,000 an hour for a Global 5000 or Gulfstream G550, and around $18,000 to $20,000 an hour for an Embraer Lineage 1000.

Why does Conor McGregor charter instead of buying a private jet?

Ownership generally makes financial sense above roughly 200 to 400 flight hours a year, and McGregor flies well below that. He has fought four times since 2016, so fight-related travel is minimal. Chartering also lets him pick a different aircraft for each mission rather than being stuck with one airframe.

Is Conor McGregor a pilot?

No. McGregor has never publicly held a pilot certificate and every aircraft he has flown on has been operated by professional charter crews. That sets him apart from celebrity pilots in this series such as John Travolta, Tom Cruise and Harrison Ford.

Why does Conor McGregor never appear in celebrity jet emissions rankings?

Those rankings are built from flight-tracking data tied to a fixed aircraft registration and a named owner. Because McGregor charters a different airframe each trip, there is no persistent tail number to follow, so no dataset exists. That reflects a gap in the tracking, not a smaller carbon footprint.

What happened to Conor McGregor at UFC 329?

McGregor returned at UFC 329 on July 11, 2026 against Max Holloway and tore the ACL and meniscus in his right knee on an opening jumping switch kick. The fight was waved off after 69 seconds, and he faces surgery with an eight to nine month recovery.