In the 12 months to April 2025, 78 million passengers flew between Europe and the US. That’s equivalent to 213,000 people daily. This ignores seasonality, which impacts fares, yields, loads, and performance. Q3 2024 (encompassing July-September) had 82% more passengers than Q1 2025 (January-March). These findings are from examining data from the US Department of Transportation.
When all airlines and routes are combined, 83.8% of the available seats were filled in the examined 12 months. This says little of performance, which is why loads should not be considered in isolation. It is the average across the year. Despite big winter capacity reductions, the DOT shows that it was just 72.9% in February 2025, which is usually the most challenging month. In contrast, 88.0% of seats were filled last July.
The 10 Airlines With The Lowest Europe-US Loads
Unsurprisingly, none of the US Big Three carriers is featured below. Indeed, the US DOT shows that 
Delta Air Lines filled 86.6% of its seats, more than 
American Airlines (83.5%) and much more than 
United Airlines (81.8%). Many major European carriers are also not present.
The sixth entry is Finnair. The carrier has expanded strongly to the US recently, partly because of its continued inability to overfly Russia, which means its previous stronghold (Asia) is far less accessible. Its passenger traffic has increased by a tenth, which was the result of higher frequencies on existing routes rather than additional links. Its load increased by over four percentage points to 78.1% compared to the year to the previous April. The impact on fares and yields is unclear.
|
Seat Load Factor: May 2024-April 2025* |
Airline |
Comments |
|---|---|---|
|
69.0% |
Singapore Airlines |
It ended Singapore-Manchester-Houston in March 2025. Its remaining Europe-US service is Singapore-Frankfurt-New York JFK, which is the US’s longest one-stop passenger operation |
|
75.8% |
Neos |
Influenced by the start of Palermo-New York JFK last June (73.1%). Bari flights started in June 2025 and are, therefore, not considered |
|
76.0% |
Azores Airlines |
Multiple routes did poorly, hence many were cut. More on this below |
|
77.3% |
Edelweiss |
Zurich-Denver had the lowest load (74.1%), although it only operated seasonally until September 2024 (flights returned in May 2025) |
|
78.1%= |
Aer Lingus |
See later in the article |
|
78.1%= |
Finnair |
See the comments above |
|
78.7% |
Virgin Atlantic |
Manchester-Las Vegas was last (65.4%). The route returned last June |
|
79.1% |
Austrian |
Vienna-Washington Dulles was bottom (74.4%) |
|
80.3% |
Norse Atlantic UK** |
Its worst performer, load-wise, was Gatwick-Las Vegas (76.8%). The route ended in February |
|
80.4% |
La Compagnie |
Newark-Milan Malpensa had the lowest load (75.5%) |
|
* Per the US DOT |
** But not its Norwegian unit |
Azores Airlines Has Cut Over Half Of Its US Network
In the analyzed period, the small Portuguese carrier had nine US routes, which is now down to four. Several were brand-new and only lasted a season. Five links have now been cut: Funchal to Boston and New York JFK, Porto to Boston and JFK, and Terceira to Oakland.
Porto-Boston had the lowest load (62.1%), although it was only served weekly with a daytime service back to Europe. TAP Air Portugal has replaced it with a four-weekly A321LR operation that runs overnight back to Europe. Meanwhile, in response to Azores Airlines’ exit from Oakland, TAP now flies Lisbon-Terceira-San Francisco.
Aer Lingus Has Grown Well, But…
In the 12 months to April 2025, the DOT shows that the Irish flag carrier (and its Aer Lingus UK unit) carried almost 2.7 million round-trip passengers to/from the US. Traffic rose by 4% compared to the year to the previous April.
This growth was primarily from launching and relaunching various routes: Dublin to Denver (started in May 2024), Las Vegas (began in October 2024), Minneapolis (restarted in April 2024), and Nashville (started in April 2025). Perhaps predictably, three of the four worst-performing routes (all sub-70.0%) were new routes. The exception was Denver-Miami, which runs in the winter (67.8%).
