After years of waiting, the digitization of on-demand charters may finally be gaining altitude. Start-ups like FlyHouse, Jettly, and Levo.aero—along with established players such as Wheels Up and XO—have rolled out apps that promise access to a private jet in as little as 30 seconds.

Speed is only part of the pitch. These platforms also tout more-competitive pricing and greater transparency than the traditional system, which can be maddeningly opaque. The latter typically involves calling a broker to discuss travel needs, budgets, and schedules, after which the broker checks in with aircraft owners, managers, or clearinghouses. Finding the right aircraft this way can take anywhere from several hours to several days, and the prices can often be estimates rather than firm quotes.

FlyHouse’s solution is to remove brokers or aircraft-management companies from the equation entirely. Users enter flight details directly into its app, which runs a reverse auction from a vetted directory of aircraft. The result is a list of jets with comparable pricing. “From the consumer’s perspective, nobody is picking the plane for me, and I have a wide selection in real time,” says FlyHouse founder and chairman Sanford Michelman. And without a broker’s fee, the cost becomes more flexible. Depending on the app’s turnaround time, Michelman notes, “you can watch prices drop as the jet owners bid for business.”

The company has also introduced a new FriendShare feature that lets users form private cohorts around common interests and organize flights where seats can be individually chartered. When set in public mode, FlyHouse’s roughly 40,000 app users are also able to view the flights, widening the pool for shared rides or per-seat sales.

Elevate Jet takes a different approach, layering artificial intelligence into its app to manage real-time expenses, multicity itineraries, and aircraft feasibility. The system evaluates whether a jet can actually fly a given route by accounting for fuel, range, crew limits, and airport constraints. “We flag hidden complexities up front,” says Greg Raiff, Elevate Jet’s founder and C.E.O. “Most charter platforms obscure how aircraft are matched to trips. You’re either relying on a broker’s word or reverse-engineering it yourself.”

The app from XO, Vista Global’s charter division, operates at far greater scale. With more than 2 million downloads, it draws on pricing algorithms tied to over 2,000 aircraft worldwide. “We look at the aircraft’s movements, which establishes the operator’s pricing logic,” explains Youssef Mouallem, chief business officer at Vista Global. “We’re right 96 percent of the time, so [we] can guarantee the prices.” XO also taps into Vista’s broader hospitality infrastructure. “Our ultra-high-net-worth clients want speed and transparency—but also the appropriate levels of service,” Mouallem adds.

Wheels Up, meanwhile, has begun blending private and commercial travel. The company recently expanded its app to include Delta Air Lines flights, reflecting the carrier’s role as its primary investor. Wheels Up C.E.O. George Mattson says this integration “reflects how our members actually travel today.” The app itself remains central to that behavior. According to chief digital officer David Godsman, it is “the preferred way members search and book.”

For all the enthusiasm, not all industry observers are sold on the app-driven model. “The best brokers could do the same thing in about an hour, with more specific details about the aircraft,” says Doug Gollan, founder and editor of the website Private Jet Card Comparisons. Many charters, he notes, are still arranged through experts with long-standing client relationships. Then again, a good broker can be hard to find, especially for newcomers to private aviation. Perhaps there will be an app for that, too.