The latest airline route news, featuring network changes, schedule alterations, codeshares and interline agreements.
April 13
Air Astana opened service between Almaty International Airport (ALA) and Shanghai Pudong International Airport (PVG). The route will be flown 3X-weekly with an Airbus A321LR aircraft. With flights to PVG, the Kazakhstan carrier now operates to six destinations in China. It already served Beijing, Guangzhou, Sanya, Urumqui and Yining. Air Astana will compete against China Eastern on the ALA-PVG route. According to OAG Schedules Analyzer data, Air Astana is offering 1,014 two-way weekly seats on the route, just behind China Eastern’s 1,056 two-way weekly seats. “We see strong and accelerating demand [to China] across both business and leisure segments, supported by visa-free travel,” Air Astana CEO Ibrahim Canliel said.
IATA said 6,500 airline routes operated in 2024 were discontinued in 2025. Routes offering fewer than 20,000 annual seats are the most vulnerable to being cut, the organization said. “Routes offering less than 20,000 seats constituted 41.8% of the global network, but 91.8% of all cancellations,” IATA said. “Of the total number of canceled routes, 76.4% offered fewer than 10,000 seats per year, despite only accounting for 27.3% of the entire route network. This highlights the vulnerability of the low-volume routes—and the passengers who rely on them—to changing circumstances. In contrast, very high-volume routes with above 250,000 seats per year accounted for 9.2% of the network, but just 0.1% of all route cancellations.” IATA said low-volume routes “feature low and fragile demand and lower flight frequency. Lacking economies of scale, it is more challenging for airlines to sustain such connections profitably.”
American Airlines started operating an Airbus A319 on flights between Provo Airport (PVU), Utah, and its Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport (DFW) hub, upgrading service on the route from regional jets. According to PVU, this is the first time American has operated the route with a mainline aircraft. The airline flies between PVU and DFW 2X-weekly.
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