Can Someone Show American Airlines’ Management Where Asia Is?

American Airlines announced six new destinations for 2026 and they are entirely uninspired. Isn’t it time American Airlines returns to Asia?

American Airlines Announces Six New Routes For 2026

American Airlines teased new routes on social media and then announced six new routes available for booking from August 11th, 2025 for flights starting as early as March of 2026. The announcement also included increased capacity to Tokyo-Haneda from Los Angeles and Dallas/Fort Worth.

The Tokyo Haneda flights represents an important uplift that may go otherwise overlooked:

“Compared to summer 2025, American will increase premium seating capacity to Tokyo (HND) from DFW and Los Angeles (LAX) by more than 45% next summer.” – American Airlines

None of these are called out as utilizing the new 787 Premium versions nor adjusting to A321s on the way from Airbus.

Uninspired Expansion

The sole new destination on the map is Budapest, the rest are already or recently served by American.

Athens was a new dot on the map a few years ago when American started flying from Philadelphia. Later it added New York-JFK competing with Delta and United from Newark. Chicago joined the map as well as Charlotte. Dallas is simply another frequency to the Greek capital.

Buenos Aires is just an extension; Miami to Milan and Philadelphia to Prague are restarting routes that the airline ran before the pandemic but had fallen away. Zurich is already served from Philadelphia, Dallas on a 777-200 is an expansion but still leaves Geneva without service from the airline.

Are any of these exciting? No. Two of them are just restarted service, and leaves the question as to whether there’s any service from which American can’t make an Athens flight work.

Nearly No Flights To Asia

American has gone from a respectable amount of trans-Pacific options to woefully inadequate. Shanghai on a single flight from Dallas and another to Seoul, join a couple of flights to Tokyo and that’s it. It previously served Beijing from multiple cities in the US, Hong Kong from LAX and Dallas. Starlux intends to join oneworld shortly with plenty of service to the US from its hub in Taipei.

For comparison, United which bought Pan Am’s route network across the Pacific has held and added new destinations in recent years including Manila, Ulaanbaatar, among mainstays like Beijing, Shanghai, Taipei, Seoul, and Hong Kong.

Cathay Pacific awards are virtually impossible for Aadvantage frequent flyers which crosses off a lot of lift from North America including Dallas, New York, San Francisco and Los Angeles (with multiple frequencies), Chicago, Vancouver, Toronto, and Boston.

Thailand has recently been cleared for US travel, Vietnam has plenty of demand, Singapore could be an opportunity for oneworld passengers in the US, Kuala Lumpur, Bali. Really, any lift back to Asia outside of Japan would be helpful.

Conclusion

The easy argument is that American Airlines management obviously knows where to put aircraft and open routes, but if that was true it wouldn’t continue to struggle to be profitable as consistently as it does. American has partners for Europe in British Airways through London, Iberia/Vueling in Spain, Finnair in Helsinki, Royal Air Maroc in Casablanca, oneworld-adjacent Aer Lingus and its own significant footprint across the continent. South America is a strong suit for the carrier too, and demand for Africa is relatively limited. It seems like American simply isn’t interested in competing to Asia while United and Delta continue to innovate and expand in the region.

What do you think?