Earlier than daybreak on Tuesday, Southwest ended its quirky (or anxiety-inducing, relying on the traveler) open-seating coverage in favor of assigned seats for all clients because the service that prided itself on marching to its personal drum turns into extra like its rivals, beneath strain to extend income.
The change implies that all Southwest passengers will know precisely the place they are going to be sitting earlier than they board, and a few of them pays greater than $70 per leg to have a brand new, roomy spot up entrance. Costs fluctuate.
“It is overdue, truthfully,” mentioned Lisa Tate, 33, a trainer from Honolulu, who was touring to Atlanta by way of Las Vegas on Monday. “I just like the reassurance that I can sit with my family members. It makes the state of affairs much less tense.”
Vicki Economou, a 68-year-old primarily based in Houston, who’s within the means of retiring from working a household restaurant, felt in any other case. “Now they’re like everyone else, and nothing is setting them aside,” she mentioned.
Economou mentioned she may contemplate flying different airways after years of Southwest loyalty as a result of she does not wish to pay for seats.
“I am not actual completely satisfied about it,” she mentioned. “I feel that there are folks which can be getting cash hungry.”
‘If you cannot beat them, be part of them’
Different airline workers greeted the final open-seating passengers with applause although, serving them espresso and handing out commemorative bag tags and different souvenirs.
Southwest has been coaching workers for months, together with by providing solutions on clear bulletins that remind clients, particularly within the early levels of assigned seating, how boarding will work.
Digital boarding screens displaying two lanes are already put in and can exchange the metallic stanchions at airports to instruct vacationers once they can get on in accordance with the brand new boarding order.
A brand new Southwest Airways boarding signal at Los Angeles Worldwide Airport debuted Jan. 27, 2026.
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Till Tuesday, Southwest was the the final U.S. service to board clients with an open seating coverage that meant passengers may choose any seat they wished as soon as they received on the aircraft. Flyers would get assigned an A, B or C group after which a quantity to line up on the gate, and the upper the boarding group and quantity, the higher their shot of getting a coveted aisle or window seat.
The top of open seating is a casualty of at this time’s customers, who Southwest executives have mentioned are searching for extra certainty on the place they will sit because the airline’s as soon as Texas-only community now sprawls from Hawaii to Costa Rica.
Eighty % of Southwest clients desire an assigned seat, market analysis discovered, CEO Bob Jordan instructed analysts in July 2024, when the airline introduced the change.
The brand new seating coverage comes after a push from buyers who’re hungry to see the airline capitalize on charges and catch as much as rivals’ revenue margins.
From 2018 by 2023, American Airways, Delta Air Strains, Frontier Airways, Spirit Airways and United Airways introduced in $12.4 billion in seating charges, in accordance with a Senate Everlasting Subcommittee on Investigations report in 2024.
It isn’t the one coverage Southwest is altering. Lower than a yr in the past, the airline ended its “two luggage fly free” coverage for all passengers and commenced charging for checked baggage. Bag charges introduced in $5.5 billion for U.S. carriers within the first 9 months of 2025 alone, in accordance with the Transportation Division.
There are exceptions for large spenders on all fronts, as is the case with different airways. Clients with sure bank cards, elite standing or those that purchase the costliest tickets can forgo some charges and choose the very best seats.
A few of the first passengers to fly with assigned seats on Southwest Airways on the brand new coverage’s debut day Jan. 27, 2026.
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“What it reveals is that Southwest has mainly mentioned if you cannot beat them, be part of them, and I truly assume that is going to be a constructive transfer for Southwest,” mentioned Henry Harteveldt, founding father of the Ambiance Analysis Group journey consulting agency. “This can be a constructive transfer for each what vacationers need and for Southwest’s income and profitability. One purpose why Southwest has struggled to draw extra frequent vacationers and poach clients from different airways is its lack of assigned seating.”
Inventory flies increased
Buyers are already excited for the top-performing airline inventory.
Southwest instructed buyers on Thursday that it expects earnings to greater than quadruple this yr from 2025 to an adjusted $4 a share, no less than, greater than what analysts anticipated, sending shares surging by nearly 20%, the most important one-day proportion acquire since 1978.
The inventory is up greater than 53% over the past 12 months by Thursday’s shut.
Different initiatives might be on the way in which, however Southwest declined to supply particulars this week.
On Thursday, nonetheless, Jordan acknowledged in an interview that this yr’s anticipated spike in income “can be troublesome to duplicate in 2027” as a result of it will be a comparability of two years with the identical insurance policies.
All aboard
The airline’s authentic plastic boarding playing cards have lengthy been changed with digital boarding passes, however clients for years set alarms to test in on the earliest second they might — 24 hours earlier than a flight — to verify they received the very best spot in line.
Comic Adam Mamawala’s Southwest check-in alarm went off throughout a set in September 2022.
“I will inform you why,” he instructed the viewers. “Tomorrow, at precisely 8:10, I am flying residence on Southwest,” he mentioned. “You assume I’m going to finish up within the C Group as a result of I am doing a present? Are you kidding me? I am checking in proper now.” He knowledgeable the viewers that he received A51, and the group cheered. (He mentioned he missed a Southwest check-in throughout a present the earlier yr and did not need it to occur once more.)
Assigned seating is the final of the key coverage shifts Southwest, which carries extra clients in america than some other airline, has introduced within the final two years.
The final Southwest Airways passengers to fly with out seat assignments line up at Daniel Okay. Inouye Worldwide Airport in Honolulu on Jan. 26, 2026.
Leslie Josephs/CNBC
Southwest in 2024 reached a settlement with activist investor Elliott Funding Administration, which had referred to as for administration modifications and famous in a single presentation that the service had lengthy eschewed what at the moment are airline trade requirements: restrictive fundamental financial system tickets, baggage charges, premium merchandise and seat assignments. Elliott declined to remark.
However there could be some rising pains for the airline as clients adapt to the modifications.
Mamawala mentioned he is turn out to be a “loyal Delta man” as a result of he flies the service extra regularly now and that he has an American Categorical card that offers him entry to the lounge at LaGuardia Airport.
However he nonetheless flies Southwest once in a while.
“Frankly I am stunned that so many Southwest devotees are seemingly heartbroken,” he mentioned. “We’re transferring from chaos to order.”
