The U.S. Department of Transportation’s Bureau of Transportation Statistics (BTS) reported today that U.S. airlines in 2015 reached all-time annual records for load factor, revenue passenger-miles (RPMs), available seat-miles (ASMs) and passenger enplanements.
2015 annual U.S. airline numbers:
Systemwide: The annual 2015 load factor (83.8) was the highest for any year, up from the previous all-time high set in 2014 (83.4). The number of systemwide passengers (798.4 million) exceeded the previous high of 769.6 million in 2007. The number of RPMs (902.4 billion) exceeded the previous high of 862.5 billion in 2014. The number of ASMs (1.07 trillion) exceeded the previous high of 1.04 trillion in 2007.
Domestic: 2015 load factor (85.0) was the highest for any year, up from the previous all-time high set in 2014 (84.5). The number of domestic passengers (696.2 million) exceeded the previous high of 679.2 million in 2007. The number of RPMs (630.8 billion) exceeded the previous high of 595.3 billion in 2014. The number of ASMs (742.1 billion) exceeded the previous high of 741.2 billion in 2007.
International: 2015 load factor (81.0) was up from 2014 (80.8) and down from annual high reached in 2013 (82.9). The number of international passengers (102.2 million) exceeded the previous high of 99.9 million in 2014. The number of RPMs (271.6 billion) exceeded the previous high of 267.2 billion in 2014. The number of ASMs (335.1 billion) exceeded the previous high of 329.9 billion in 2014.
December monthly U.S. airline numbers:
Systemwide (domestic and international) scheduled service load factor – a measure of the use of airline capacity – rose to 84.3 percent in December, seasonally adjusted, following one month of decline. Seasonal adjustment allows the comparing of monthly load factors to all other months.
Load factor is a measure of the use of aircraft capacity that compares the system use, measured in RPMs as a proportion of system capacity, measured in ASMs.
The seasonally-adjusted load factor rose from November (83.8) to December (84.3) because passenger travel grew faster (1.5 percent increase in RPMs) than system capacity (0.8 percent increase in ASMs).
Trends: Seasonally-adjusted
In December, RPMs and ASMs reached all-time monthly highs. The load factor of 84.3 was the third highest on record. Systemwide passenger enplanements (68.2 million) and domestic passenger enplanements (59.5 million) were the second highest on record. International passenger enplanements (8.7 million) were the highest on record.
See Air Traffic Release for summary tables and additional data. Additional traffic data can be found on the BTS Airlines and Airports page. Click on a link in the Quick Links box on the right. See Load factor, RPMs,ASMs and Passengers. For more historical data, see Traffic on the BTS website. See Seasonal Adjustmentfor methodology and additional explanation. See data for airline data since 2000 as well as seasonally-adjusted data for rail, transit, pipelines, trucking and waterways.
