As the United States' southern neighbor and home to miles of warm beaches, Mexico has for decades held the top spot of the foreign country that American citizens visit the most.
According to numbers from the country's Ministry of the Interior, the 12.7 million Americans who came to Mexico in 2024 marked a 5% increase from the previous year. That number has risen steadily each year since the pandemic-related drop in travel in 2020.
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Where are all these Mexico flights going?
With travel demand coming from U.S. tourists and members of the Mexican diaspora traveling back and forth, numerous airlines have moved to meet demand by launching new routes not just to popular resort towns like Cancun but multiple large and mid-size cities across the country.
On Feb. 13, Alaska Airlines (ALK) started running its new flight to Monterrey in northeastern Mexico from Los Angeles International Airport (LAX). The new flight will run daily on an Embraer E175 (ERJ) plane and was alongside another new route to La Paz launched by the airline — a 90-minute drive from the larger Los Cabos, the Baja California resort town has been seeing a rapid spike in popularity.
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"We look forward to continuing to serve as the carrier of choice from the West Coast, especially as we prepare to start service to these popular destinations in Mexico," said Alaska Airlines Vice President of Revenue Management And Network Planning Kirsten Amrine in a statement when the flights were first announced last July.
Last month, American Airlines (AAL) also began running a new flight between Dallas-Fort Worth Airport (DFW) and Tampico International Airport (TAM) on Mexico's Gulf Coast.
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On Mexico's side, flagship carrier Aeromexico (GRPAF) revealed a bankruptcy emergence expansion plan that includes seven new flights to destinations across North America that will start running by the end of 2025.
The U.S. routes include flights between Mexico City and Philadelphia and San Luis Potosí to Atlanta that are slated to launch in June and a just-announced route to Mexico City International Airport (MEX) from Phoenix. The Mexico City-Phoenix route will run on a Boeing 737 Max (BA) jet.
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According to the airline, the new routes will bring the number of seats Aeromexico flies to the United States on a weekly basis to 24% more than it flew in 2019 (the airline filed for bankruptcy in 2020 and emerged from insolvency by 2022).
Low-cost airlines are also launching new flights to Mexican destinations
On the low-cost airline end, Mexico City-based Volaris and Viva Aerobus just launched new routes to Zacatecas in north-central Mexico from Oakland International Airport (OAK) for the former and between Phoenix and Guadalajara for the latter.
In launching all these routes, every airline cited both high traveler interest in off-the-beaten-path destinations and the rise of business travel as influencing demand.
"We are pleased to announce that Alaska Airlines will begin operations from Monterrey Airport to Los Angeles, expanding its services from our airports along with Mazatlan and Zihuatanejo," Ricardo Dueñas, who heads the Grupo Aeroportuario del Centro Norte, said in a statement on the airline's new routes.
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