American Airlines is launching a new long haul route, though unfortunately it won’t last for long. While we first learned about these plans last week, the new flight is now on sale, meaning that the schedule has also been published.
In this post:
American fills in for Qantas on Los Angeles to Brisbane route
Currently, Qantas operates up to daily flights between Los Angeles (LAX) and Brisbane (BNE), using Airbus A330-200s. For the upcoming peak season, American will be taking over some of those flights.
Specifically, between December 5, 2025, and January 30, 2026, American will fly 3x weekly between Los Angeles and Brisbane, replacing Qantas’ frequencies. Here’s the schedule for American’s new flight:
AA42 Los Angeles to Brisbane departing 9:55PM arriving 6:00AM (+2 days)
AA43 Brisbane to Los Angeles departing 11:30AM arriving 6:30AM
American will operate the 7,161-mile route with a Boeing 787-9, featuring 285 seats, including 30 business class seats, 21 premium economy seats, and 234 economy seats. American will fly the westbound flight on Sundays, Tuesdays, and Fridays, and it’s blocked at 14hr5min, while American will fly the eastbound flight on Sundays, Tuesdays, and Thursdays, and it’s blocked at 13hr.
This means that during the peak period, Qantas will operate the route 4x weekly, while American will operate the route 3x weekly. The new flight is now on sale, though don’t expect much in the way of upgrade space or reasonably priced premium cabin award availability.
Brisbane has received quite a bit of new service from US airlines in recent years, thanks to significant incentives for offering such service. I suspect this route won’t be eligible for any major incentives, since American is just temporarily filling in for Qantas.
This new route complements American operating daily seasonal flights to Brisbane out of Dallas (DFW). In the Los Angeles to Brisbane market, Delta also operates 3x weekly seasonal flights.
We haven’t seen all that much long haul expansion from American in recent years, especially out of Los Angeles. Seemingly the only way for American to grow is to simply fill in service for a partner airline.
Why American is filling in for Qantas on this route
In Northern Winter, US airlines struggle with where to fly their wide body aircraft profitably. Meanwhile in the Southern Hemisphere, that time of year is peak season, where airlines have to do everything possible to maximize capacity.
American and Qantas have a transpacific joint venture, so American is essentially taking over a few weekly frequencies on this route so that Qantas can expand elsewhere. What’s causing this change? Well, Qantas has just announced a larger shake-up to its international network.
In December 2025, Qantas is launching new routes from Perth (PER) to both Auckland (AKL) and Johannesburg (JNB) using Airbus A330s, so presumably that’s (in part) what the aircraft being freed up here will be used for. Then the airline will have a bit more wiggle room in its schedule come February, which is when the peak season starts to slow down a bit.
We’re also seeing a larger capacity shift across the Pacific:
- In December 2025 and January 2025, Qantas will increase Melbourne (MEL) to Dallas (DFW) service from 4x weekly to 7x weekly
- Starting in January 2026, Qantas will continue to operate Sydney (SYD) to Dallas (DFW) service daily, but will go from 4x weekly A380s to daily A380s (so 3x weekly 787 frequencies are being replaced by A380s)
What American is doing here isn’t unheard of, and it’s a somewhat common practice among joint venture partners. For example, in early 2025, we saw Delta fill in for LATAM on the Boston (BOS) to Sao Paulo (GRU) route, with a very similar arrangement.
Bottom line
In December 2025 and January 2026, American will fly 3x weekly between Los Angeles and Brisbane, representing a new route for the airline. This will be American’s second service to Brisbane, as the airline also flies there out of Dallas.
In reality, though, American doesn’t actually have plans to operate this route long term, but instead, the carrier is just filling in for joint venture partner Qantas. Qantas will instead use A330s to fly from Perth to Auckland and Johannesburg, while expanding service to the United States using other aircraft.
It’s always cool to see a new long haul route from American (especially out of LAX), but I’d say this hardly qualifies.
What do you make of American operating the Los Angeles to Brisbane route?
You sure Qantas is operating A330-200s from LAX to BNE? The max range of that aircraft is 5500miles...won't quite make it across the pond...
They've been flying the A332 on that route for years, and the aircraft's brochure range is 6,750 nautical miles at the w/v Qantas has selected... even with specific carrier variances, it can do the route just fine (obviously).
When AA started flights to Australia its planes couldn't carry fuel to fly DFW-SYD, they'd stop in Brisbane to get more, then onto SYD. 3-Mil in Brisbane, lots of flights to choose from.
Australian passengers are hardly going to be happy.