According to footage posted of his motorcade leaving and returning to Moscow's Vnukovo airport, he was here for little more than 12 hours.
And for most of that, it seems, he was left waiting.
Mr Witkoff, a former property mogul who has become Donald Trump's chief negotiator, and is often referred to as the president's 'fixer', had been dispatched to Moscow to deliver the US proposal for a 30-day ceasefire to Vladimir Putin.
His visit had been scheduled near the start of the week, following the US-Ukraine talks in Saudi Arabia.
But after arriving around lunchtime on Thursday, he was left twiddling his thumbs for at least eight hours before being called into the Kremlin.
Mr Putin was apparently too busy meeting someone else - Belarusian leader Aleksander Lukashenko - for a hastily arranged state visit that had been announced the day before.
We don't know for sure if the timing of Mr Lukashenko's visit was deliberate, but it certainly didn't feel like a coincidence.
Instead, it felt like a classic Putin power play.
The Kremlin leader doesn't like to be backed into a corner and told what to do, especially on his own turf.
This felt like a message to the Americans - "I'm the boss, I set the schedule, and I'm not beholden to anyone".
He did eventually grant Mr Witkoff that all-important face time, once night had fallen and behind closed-doors.
MNA/
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