- Airlines around the world have been on a roller coaster of schedules and operational challenges since March 2020.
- With carriers shrinking and expanding throughout COVID-19, the industry looks different today than it did pre-pandemic.
- Aviation data company OAG shared with Insider the world’s largest airlines based on available seats in 2021.
Over the past two and a half years, the airline industry has changed dramatically.
Since March 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic has forced airlines around the world to scale back and reschedule as travel has halted and countries have closed their borders. Pilots sought early retirement, employees were furloughed and planes parked.
But strong post-pandemic demand is turning the industry upside down. As travel recovers faster than expected, airlines are buying new planes, flying new routes and launching aggressive hiring campaigns to keep operations running smoothly with more foot traffic on the ground and in the air. We are making moves to catch up, such as continuing to operate in
Globally, airlines will carry an estimated 2.2 billion people and fly 22.2 million flights in 2021, research firm Finances Online reported, citing data from the International Air Transport Authority (IATA). This compares to 1.8 billion in 2020, only 40% of the 4.5 billion carried in 2019, according to IATA.
Amidst all the turmoil, which is the world’s largest airline today? The US ‘Big 4’ airlines, including American Airlines, United Airlines, Delta Air Lines, Southwest Airlines, and several Chinese airlines will offer It turned out to rank in the top 20 with hundreds of millions of seats available. Based on data from The Official Airline Guide (OAG), a London-based aviation analytics company.
The organization also provided a 2018 data set to Insider in 2019, revealing American Airlines as the world’s largest airline. Since then, the rankings have changed, with Southwest Airlines becoming the world’s largest airline by seat capacity. Several top 20 airlines in 2018 offer significantly fewer seats in 2021.
On the other hand, some airlines, like JetBlue Airways and Hainan Airlines, were not included in the 2018 dataset but added capacity to the list last year.
Below are the 20 largest airlines in the world by the number of seats available to customers.
20. Alaska Airlines
Alaska Airlines.
Alaska Airlines
Country:America
2021 capacity: 33,645,148 seats
2018 capacity: 54,574,295 seats
19. Shandong Airlines
Shandong Airlines.
Marcus Mainka/Shutterstock
Country: China
2021 capacity: 33,735,751 seats
2018 capacity: not included in the top 20 datasets in 2018
18. Hainan Airlines
Hainan Airlines.
TonyV3112/Shutterstock
Country: China
2021 capacity: 38,230,597 seats
2018 capacity: not included in the top 20 datasets in 2018
17. Xiamen Airlines
Xiamen Airlines.
PomInOz/Shutterstock
Country: China
2021 capacity: 39,087,022 seats
2018 capacity: not included in the top 20 datasets in 2018
16. Sichuan Airlines
Sichuan Airlines.
Levius/Shutterstock
Country: China
2021 capacity: 39,294,914 seats
2018 capacity: not included in the top 20 datasets in 2018
15. easyjet
EasyJet.
Simone Previdi/Shutterstock
Country: England
2021 capacity: 39,490,376 seats
2018 capacity: 100,082,969 seats
14. Shenzhen Airlines
Shenzhen Airlines.
TonyV3112/Shutterstock
Country: China
2021 capacity: 39,727,188 seats
2018 capacity: not included in the top 20 datasets in 2018
13. JetBlue Airways
JetBlue Airways.
Lucas Wanderlich/Shutterstock
Country:America
2021 capacity: 40,356,063 seats
2018 capacity: not included in the top 20 datasets in 2018
12. Spirit Airlines
Spirit Airlines.
Carlos Yudica/Shutterstock
Country:America
2021 capacity: 40,622,515 seats
2018 capacity: not included in the top 20 datasets in 2018
11. Turkish Airlines
Turkish Airlines.
Marcus Mainka/Shutterstock.com
Country: turkey
2021 capacity: 45,249,215 seats
2018 capacity: 93,109,025 seats
10. Ryanair
Ryan Air.
Jason Cairnuff/Reuters
Country: Ireland
2021 capacity: 48,696,471 seats
2018 capacity: 142,540,776 seats
9. Skywest Airlines
Skywest Airlines.
Heather Dunbar / Shutterstock.com
Country:America
2021 capacity: 48,696,471 seats
2018 capacity: 142,540,776 seats
8. Indigo
indigo.
NurPhoto by Nicolas Economo/Getty Images.
Country:India
2021 capacity: 72,444,166 seats
2018 capacity: 74,570,054 seats
7. Air China
air china.
Dmitry Rufrenko/Shutterstock
Country: China
2021 capacity: 75,905,153 seats
2018 capacity: 90,531,776 seats
6. United Airlines
United Airlines.
EQ Roy/Shutterstock
Country:America
2021 capacity: 97,220,490 seats
2018 capacity: 193,981,547 seats
5. China Eastern Airlines
China Eastern Airlines.
VCG/VCG via Getty Images
Country: China
2021 capacity: 115,625,762 seats
2018 capacity: 122,917,175 seats
4. China Southern Airlines
China Southern Airlines.
airbus
Country: China
2021 capacity: 123,472,958 seats
2018 capacity: 131,972,745 seats
3. Delta Air Lines
Delta Airlines.
Photo in action/Shutterstock
Country:America
2021 capacity: 143,180,744 seats
2018 capacity: 233,758,798 seats
2. American Airlines
American Airlines.
Nicholas Economou/Getty Images
Country:America
2021 capacity: 151,146,489 seats
2018 capacity: 256,928,663 seats
1. Southwest Airlines
Southwest Airlines.
Jonathan Weiss/Shutterstock
Country:America
2021 capacity: 168,852,981 seats
2018 capacity: 209,526,838 seats
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