Frontier Airlines announces new Atlanta routes in 2025

Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport’s volumes are about 80% controlled by Delta Air Lines and its partners.

Depending on the extent of the Southwest Airlines route cuts expected this spring, Frontier may soon surpass it to become ATL’s second-largest carrier, the airport’s director of air service Rebecca Francosky told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. (Southwest represented less than 7% of Atlanta airport traffic in December.)

Southwest announced last fall it would cut about a third of its Atlanta destinations and crew this year. It has been the city’s No. 2 carrier since merging with AirTran Airways a decade ago, vowing to be a low-cost alternative to Delta.

Frontier, which first hired Atlanta-based crew in 2021 and has been rapidly expanding since, appears poised to take on more of that role.

After the new routes launch in May and June, the low-cost carrier will serve 52 destinations with 16 daily flights from Atlanta, said Frontier’s president, James Dempsey. Many of its routes are operated with three flights a week or less.

The airline will soon employ about 1,200 people at the airport, directly and through contractors, he said.

In an interview, Dempsey told the AJC the airline likes “the performance” it has seen from the existing Atlanta routes, and he thinks Frontier’s route map is complementary to Hartsfield-Jackson’s dominant hometown airline.

“We follow the population densities in the United States and where people want to travel. We offer a product that is largely leisure focused.”

Only about 5% of its traffic is business passengers, he said. Delta, meanwhile, heavily promotes its business travel services.

Dempsey said Frontier would love to grow into becoming Atlanta’s second-largest carrier.

“We’re never going to be the first. We know that. But we think we can have a complementary route network to coexist with other airlines in the airport, that provides profitable growth and sustainable growth.”

Frontier, an ultralow-cost carrier that charges extra for things like carry-on bags, recently announced improvements to its customer service operations, the addition of first class seats to its planes later this year and an “enhanced loyalty program,” he added.

Atlanta has been one of the airline’s top three markets since its last expansion in 2023. The 2025 news coincides with a move of its operations to newly constructed gates on the E Concourse.

“Frontier’s expansion is proof that ATL remains the airport of choice for airlines looking to scale,” said interim airport general manager Jan Lennon at a news conference Thursday.

“We are committed to providing the infrastructure, efficiency and passenger experience to support the growth.”

Frontier’s new Atlanta routes

The new routes will begin operation in May and June