American has revealed plans to resume its longest domestic route, which will offer travelers in Chicago a warm winter getaway. I first wrote about this a couple of days ago, but want to provide an update, as the schedule has now been published, and the flight is on sale.
American’s Chicago to Honolulu route resumes in late 2025
American has announced a moderate expansion out of Chicago, with the most significant addition being a new route between Chicago (ORD) and Honolulu (HNL). As of October 26, 2025, the airline will operate the route on a daily basis, with the following schedule:
AA75 Chicago to Honolulu departing 9:45AM arriving 3:00PM
AA74 Honolulu to Chicago departing 6:00PM arriving 7:10AM (+1 day)
This will be a seasonal winter route, though I don’t yet know exactly when it’ll end (I’d assume around the end of the IATA winter schedule, in late March 2026, but that remains to be seen).
The flight is blocked at 9hr15min westbound and 8hr10min eastbound. American will use a Boeing 787-8 for the route, featuring 234 seats, including 20 business class seats, 28 premium economy seats, and 186 economy seats.
American last operated this route up until 2021. At 4,243 miles, this will be American’s longest domestic route. American’s current longest domestic route is from Dallas (DFW) to Honolulu, which is around 500 miles shorter. In the past, American also operated a route from Charlotte (CLT) to Honolulu, which was even longer, at 4,678 miles, but no longer operates.
This seems like a pretty safe route addition
All of the “big three” US carriers have the same issue when it comes to their wide body jets — they have very strong demand across the Atlantic in summer, but then have to figure out where to fly their wide body jets as profitably as possible in winter.
Obviously there’s some demand to the South Pacific, South America, etc., but there’s just not as much high yield demand as in summer. In that sense, Chicago to Honolulu seems like a safe route addition, since there’s always demand for a warm winter getaway for those in cold climates.
Admittedly yields aren’t quite as high on these routes as they would be across the Atlantic in summer (Honolulu is further from Chicago than London), but still, this is probably as good as it gets.
It’s interesting to see American bringing back a route out of Chicago, given that the airline has progressively been reducing its presence there over the years. Going back many years, American and United competed pretty closely in Chicago, while nowadays, United’s presence is materially larger. Not only that, but United continues to invest and expand in Chicago, while American has mostly been pulling back.
Clearly these latest route additions counter that trend. American’s other newly announced destinations out of Chicago include Bismarck (BIS), Boise (BOI), Colorado Springs (COS), Halifax (YHZ), and Hyannis (HYA), and Spokane (GEG). American is also launching a route to Naples (NAP), but that had been previously announced.
Bottom line
As of late October 2025, American will resume a daily winter seasonal service between Chicago and Honolulu, for the first time in over four years. It’s cool to see this route return, especially given how Chicago hasn’t really been a focus for the airline.
What do you make of American resuming Chicago to Honolulu flights?
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