dailynewsnblog
American Airlines is the world’s largest carrier in multiple ways, including for passenger numbers. In 2025, the 
oneworld member carried 224 million passengers. This was its second-best year to date, behind 2024, as traffic fell by 1%.
In 2025, American transported almost 186 million people domestically. It was comfortably the US’s largest domestic operator. It carried more than one in five of the country’s passengers (22%). However, it was ‘only’ the country’s second-largest international carrier (38 million).
American’s Route With The Lowest Load
Across all of 2025, the US Department of Transportation shows that 
American’s average load factor (technically, seat factor) across its entire network was 83.6%. This was higher than for United Airlines (82.2%) but lower than for Delta Air Lines (83.7%). When domestic routes are considered, American’s result was 83.2%. In contrast, it achieved 84.3% internationally.
Load factors should not be considered in isolation. It is important to appreciate that it is always about how they were achieved. Of course, if they’re particularly low, as in many of the following results, that speaks volumes. In most cases, wider context is important.
With an exceptionally but perhaps not unexpectedly poor load of just 18.0% (!), 
New York JFK to Worcester was by far the worst route in this sense. This very short airport pair, which covered just 130 nautical miles (241 km) each way, was served until July 2025 partly, if not exclusively, for slot-sitting reasons. It has since ended. 5,005 round-trip passengers were carried last year.
In 2025, Cirium Diio shows that American Eagle flew daily using Republic Embraer E175s. The 76-seat jet had the equivalent of just 14 passengers per flight. No month exceeded a quarter full. The worst month was June, when average passengers per flight fell to just 12.
Only 43% Full: Southwest’s 10 Emptiest International Routes
Some of them are barely ever discussed…
American’s Second To Fifth-Lowest Results
With just 40.9% of seats filled, Phoenix to Santa Maria was second (9,292 passengers). Next was New York JFK to Saint Vincent (44.5%; 2,298 passengers), followed by Chicago O’Hare to Waterloo (47.3%; 36,896 passengers) and New York LaGuardia to Dayton (48.9%; 12,828 passengers).
The route to Saint Vincent and the Grenadines only started in December 2024, and it continues to operate seasonally. Three carriers operated for the first time: American, Caribbean Airlines, and JetBlue. Until 2023, only Caribbean Airlines served it. Clearly, it has excess capacity. More broadly, Delta recently began the first-ever flight from Atlanta to Saint Vincent. These things, and more, contribute to the US having by far the highest number of seats to/from the Caribbean nation in 2026.
|
Day |
New York JFK to Saint Vincent; Local Times* |
Saint Vincent To New York JFK; Local Times |
|---|---|---|
|
Saturday |
8:00 AM-1:50 PM |
2:50 PM-7:15 PM |
|
* In December 2026 |
** In December 2026 |
The link to Dayton ended in September. Now no airline operates between LaGuardia and the so-called Birthplace of Aviation. Neither New York JFK nor Newark have flights either. In 2025, 34,033 passengers traveled to/from Greater New York JFK. It is, of course, now Dayton’s largest unserved city.
Perhaps the most notable entry is Phoenix to Santa Maria. American Eagle’s flights only began in October 2025. Until then, the airport pair had not been served, but Allegiant operated between Phoenix Mesa and Santa Maria in 2007-2008 and again in 2021-2022. Despite the newness of American’s link, the route will end on May 6, 2026. With a rather bullish twice-daily service using SkyWest CRJ900s, it only filled an average of 31 out of 76 seats through December.
American’s Sixth To Tenth-Lowest Results
In sixth place was Chicago O’Hare to Springfield, Illinois (48.9%; 39,454 passengers), followed by Charlotte to Florence (50.0%; 49,008 passengers), Los Angeles to Vail (53.8%; 5,446 passengers), New York LaGuardia to Sarasota (54.7%; 19,671 passengers), and Miami to Harrisburg (54.9%; 2,489 passengers).
Only LaGuardia to Sarasota is no longer served by American. Initially, flights briefly operated in 2020, and again on a very limited basis in 2023 and early 2024. They returned on a weekly basis in summer 2024, when Republic E175s were deployed. With relatively low capacity, loads were good: 84.4% to 93.0%.
Perhaps motivated by these results, the route was upgauged to mainline A320s and up to a daily frequency in winter 2024/2025. Unsurprisingly, the considerable increase in capacity meant that the load factor fell dramatically. In January 2025, for example, only 43.8% of seats were filled. The final departure took place last May.
