Delta Air Lines is preparing for its busiest year at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport (ATL). Despite operating fewer weekly flights than in 2019, the company is reserving much more seats for passengers.
The busiest year in Atlanta.
Delta Air Lines will celebrate its 100th birthday in March 2025, a remarkable occasion that only a few airlines in the world have had the opportunity to commemorate.
This includes SkyTeam members Air France and KLM, as well as carriers like Aeroflot, Qantas, Avianca, British Airways, Finnair, and the now-defunct Czech Airlines. Czech Airlines celebrated its centennial a year before being amalgamated into its parent company, Smartwings.
According to Cirium’s Diio Mi airline planning system, Delta Air Lines had an average of 6,679 weekly flights and 967,745 weekly seats from Atlanta in 2019. As a result, the average weekly available seat kilometers (ASK) exceeded 1.46 billion.
In 2025, the airline has booked an average of 6,391 weekly flights from the airport, which, while less than in 2019, will result in 1.025 million weekly seats and 1.6 billion ASKs. According to Diio Mi statistics, the carrier’s average seats per departure from the airport will rise from 144.9 in 2019 to 160.3 by 2025.
July will be the airline’s busiest month, with an average of 966.4 daily departures from Atlanta, up from 966 in June. Interestingly, during the same two summer months in 2019, Delta Air Lines averaged over 1,000 departures each day.
However, while only three months in 2019 averaged more than one million weekly seats, the number is expected to increase to nine by 2025, implying that over a million Delta Air Lines passengers may conceivably transit through Atlanta for the majority of the year.
Passenger Experience Innovations
At the same time, innovations will be made to the airline’s passenger experience. Delta Air Lines unveiled many improvements at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas, which kicked off on January 7.
Delta Air Lines will integrate ‘Delta Concierge’ into its Fly Delta app starting in 2025. The generative artificial intelligence (AI) tool aims to enhance a customer’s journey by providing personalized and seamless experiences, similar to a personal assistant.
“The AI assistant will work on behalf of the customer to better understand arrival and departure needs and create efficiencies that save time and stress.”
In addition, the carrier has worked with Uber (after abandoning its agreement with Lyft) and YouTube. The former will allow passengers to earn SkyMiles on eligible rides and deliveries, while the latter, which builds on the Delta Sync experience announced in 2023, will use YouTube’s premium options to bring the platform’s content to its seatback entertainment screens ad-free.
The airline will also enhance Delta Sync, beginning with future aircraft deliveries in 2026. Delta Air Lines is partnering with Thales to introduce “intelligent” 4K HDR QLED displays, Bluetooth in all cabins, a 96-terabyte storage system for more content options, an advanced recommendation engine, and seatback features for passenger control, including a ‘Do Not Disturb’ mode.
A bright future
Innovations will extend beyond the passenger experience. Delta Air Lines and Airbus announced at the same event in Las Vegas that they would strengthen their partnership by focusing on innovations and new technologies such as sustainable aviation fuel (SAF).
exploring future aircraft technologies, and testing fello’fly, which mimics geese formation flying. According to its statement, the airline will take part in a flight test for the latter in the second half of 2025.
“With this flying technique, the first aircraft creates an uplift that drives fuel efficiency for the following aircraft, called wake energy retrieval, which can reduce fuel consumption.”
During the company’s investor day in November, Delta Air Lines’ CEO, Ed Bastian, stated that the airline’s executives were extremely correct in their belief that 2025 will be the finest year in the airlines history.