One Airline Has Proven To Be The Most Consistently Cheap In America

The many airline options to choose from when flying are meant to keep healthy competition in the commercial airline industry. Such competition between companies often involves competitive pricing for potential customers. While this is true for all commercial airlines in the industry, there is a large subcategory marketed specifically as budget airlines. Think Spirit, Avelo, Frontier, and a handful of others. However, even though they are all in this category, one is the cheapest of them all.

Aside from what the customer pays, a budget airline is classified as such based on how much revenue the airline receives per seat mile on their flights. Frontier Airlines takes the top spot by this measurement, and is therefore the cheapest U.S.-based airline. Frontier only makes just under one dime per available seat mile. In comparison, Spirit Airlines makes slightly above one dime per seat mile, and the non-budget United Airlines makes 16 cents. Southwest Airlines is still considered to be among the cheaper airlines, but its revenue is actually 17 cents per seat mile.

Frontier Airlines keeps its fares low, often well below $100. Yet the final costs might not be quite as low as they seem. As with other budget airlines, you'll pay extra to bring more than just a small personal item on board. Even carry-ons have an attached fee. You can opt out of choosing a seat with Frontier and wait until you get assigned one at check in, but if you do have seat preferences, you'll have another added cost to choose ahead of time. Nevertheless, don't write off Frontier for these sneaky fees. This airline does have some unique offerings, like the all-you-can-fly pass and frequent sales where you can score even lower fares.

While Frontier makes more money thanks to their additional baggage and seat choice fees, that less than one dime per seat mile in revenue sounds like it would be hard for Frontier (and other budget airlines) to even stay in business. But when you think of how many miles each plane flies, it makes a bit more sense. Even with these profit logistics, budget airlines might be endangered, partly because of higher fuel prices. Perhaps take advantage of airlines like Frontier sooner rather than later.