Clear was made pointless almost immediately after launch by the introduction of TSA Pre, and ever since then has been desperately trying to find a reason to exist. They can’t actually replace the official security screening, because TSA runs that. Their weak value-add is to let you jump to the front of the line, which obviously has nothing to do with security. They might as well simplify matters by just offering to let people enrolled in TSA Pre pay another $150/year for a pass to jump the line, and thus avoid all the maintenance of those iris scanners or whatever they are.

I agree, except I don't think it is a "weak value-add". It only takes one missed flight for it to be worthwhile for me.

I meant there's no value added there by Clear despite their fancy machines and the trappings of a security service. They could be replaced by a simple fee charged by the airlines/airport to access a "premium line" for Precheck.

Sometimes the Precheck line is longer than the standard one. Maybe there's room for both. Maybe people could do live bidding for line position. Maybe they could use the money to make flying not suck. Maybe I'll just stay home.

A Precheck line has to be substantially longer than the regular line to be slower. Not only is there not as much that each passenger has to do, but overwhelmingly they are frequent fliers who know the routine for screening.

I'm already measuring long-ness in terms of time. I saw that on the last trip I took. Precheck was ~2 minutes. Standard was ~30 seconds. It wasn't a problem. But it was a curious scenario.

Clear gets you to the TSA agent faster but not to a precheck line. It just helps you skip the initial line.

If you have PreCheck, they do take you to the PreCheck line. In some larger airports, there are separate Clear check-in locations for PreCheck and regular passengers with Clear, and at some (Atlanta, for instance), Clear PreCheck has it's own, dedicated security line.

Global Entry is only when you come into the country and have to go through immigration. It does nothing for when you have to board a plane.

Sort of. Global Entry also includes PreCheck -- your global entry ID number is also your PreCheck ID. PreCheck does help (quite a bit) with the TSA security lines/etc., so in a way, GE does help you more than just at border crossings.

Clear also works at other venues like concerts or sporting events