These Are the Most Exciting New Airline Routes Launching in August

02.08.2024 - 14:05 / travelandleisure.com

Hot August nights are here. The kids go back to school soon, and many travelers’ minds are on that final summer break — Labor Day weekend, maybe — and cooler autumn days ahead.

At the beginning of every month, Travel+Leisure highlights the most exciting routes launching that month. Airlines, like the travelers they serve, historically change little in August as they eye the fall ahead. But this year, eager to compete with their bigger competitors, budget airlines are rapidly growing. Meanwhile, other carriers are still building back from the pandemic or filling in the gaps on their map.

Frontier Airlines continues its breakneck growth in August with seven new routes. The routes, all of which begin on either August 13 or 14, include Atlanta to Boston and Los Angeles, Boston to Charlotte and Dallas-Fort Worth (DFW), New York (JFK) to Las Vegas, and Sacramento to Los Angeles and San Diego. Frontier takes on a who’s who of U.S. airline competition with the additions, including American Airlines, Delta Air Lines, Southwest Airlines, and United Airlines; not a single one of its new routes is unserved, according to aviation data analytics firm Cirium Diio. Frontier will fly all seven routes daily with introductory airfares ranging from $19 to $69 one way.

Fellow discounter Spirit Airlines will add two new routes in August. The carrier will link Fort Lauderdale and Rochester, N.Y., and DFW and Houston Bush from August 13 and 14, respectively. One way Fort Lauderdale-Rochester fares range from $39 to $41 for a flight that departs South Florida at 7:40 p.m. and arrives in Upstate New York three hours later. One way DFW-Houston fares range from $20 to $39 for the one-hour-and-15-minute flight that departs DFW around noon and 8 p.m. American, Frontier, and United fly the DFW-Houston route, and Southwest serves the cities from nearby Dallas Love and Houston Hobby airports.

Not to be left out, budget airline Sun Country will connect its Minneapolis-St. Paul base to Monterey, California, from August 8, and to Manchester, New Hampshire, from August 22. Both routes operate less than daily with introductory airfares ranging from $69 to $79 one way. Sun Country is the only airline flying both routes.

United resumes flights between San Francisco and Detroit as well as to St. Louis on August 19. The airline suspended both routes early in the pandemic. United will offer up to two flights a day on both routes with departures from San Francisco to Detroit around 11 a.m. and a red-eye just before 11 p.m. Departures to St. Louis are just after 11 a.m. and around 6:30 p.m. Economy airfares from San Francisco to Detroit range from $204 to $573 one way, and to St. Louis from $175 to $493 one way.

Southwest will resume flights