Airline Scorecards

How the airline quarter opens up

Applies to everything broken down by airline: the Scorecards and each airline's demand index. Airport totals across all airlines are daily, weekly and monthly in Pro.

Capacity guidance for Q4 2026

Delta guided on seats, without a seat-mile figure. United gave no capacity figure in its Q3 2026 release; its last numeric guide (April) is shown as last stated, with no verdict. Allegiant guided Allegiant and Sun Country combined; its Scorecard counts Allegiant's own flights, so the guide is shown with no verdict.

Published accuracy

Before any "vs guide" line, the scope is backtested: for every quarter since 2023, seat-miles rebuilt from BTS T-100 with regional partners assigned to the airline that sells the seats, against the growth each airline reported. A line is shown only where the gap was stable (at least 8 quarters, standard deviation of 1 point or less, no quarter more than 2 points off).

This proves the scope. Our own seat estimates for the current year are checked against BTS as each month is published. Alaska, Frontier and Allegiant's demand indexes are capacity-led (their seat growth) and are shown with their numbers.

Coverage and method

Seats

Each flight's seats are estimated from its aircraft type and the seats airlines fly on that type (BTS T-100, latest 12 months); seat-miles are seats times the great-circle distance. The share of flights without a seat estimate is shown with the figures.

Airline

Flights are counted with the airline that sells the seats: SkyWest, Republic, Envoy, PSA, Endeavor and the other regional partners count with United, Delta or American as they fly for them.

Scope

Domestic: flights between US airports, each once. To and from the US: domestic plus international flights departing or arriving at US airports; flying wholly outside the US is not included. The international part is marked provisional until it has been checked against BTS T-100 for the airline.

Last year

Each day is compared with the same weekday a year earlier: domestic flights from BTS On-Time with the same seat method, international seat-miles from BTS T-100 for that quarter, split by month in the airline's own T-100 pattern.

Q4 2026

Our flight activity starts on October 26, 2026. October 1 to 25 is estimated, for domestic flying only, from adsb.lol aircraft position reports: each airline's departures between US airports are counted from the position tracks and given seats from the same aircraft-type table, then its flights, seats and seat-miles are each divided by that airline's ratio of position-report counts to our flight activity over October 27 to 31. BTS On-Time replaces these days when it publishes October (about mid-December). International flying is not estimated, so seat-miles to and from the US start on October 26, and a call against guidance needs 30 days of our own flight activity. Airport figures do not use these estimates.

Passengers per seat

TSA screenings at the airline's hub checkpoints against the domestic seats departing those hubs, as an index: 100 is the same ratio as the same week last year. TSA does not see connecting passengers, so it is a trend, not a load factor.

Guidance

Each airline's own capacity guidance, quoted from its earnings release or 8-K with the date. Never consensus: we have no estimates data.

Not real-time, not a load factor and not a forecast of earnings. Compared with company guidance only.

Source: Passenger Index flight activity data, compiled by Passenger Index; screenings from TSA; last year's flights from BTS On-Time and seats and seat-miles from BTS T-100. Capacity guidance quoted from each airline's own earnings release. Not affiliated with any airline or agency. Not investment advice.

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• Guidance and backtests (CSV)