Spirit Airlines has served Puerto Rico for greater than 20 years. The airline launched Fort Lauderdale to San Juan in November 2001, joined by Orlando-San Juan the next May. Over 20 years later, ULCC Spirit is the second-largest operator between Puerto Rico and the US mainline, considered a domestic market.
Spirit: Puerto Rico to the US mainland
Except for San Juan, Spirit also serves Aguadilla (which joined its network in 2007) and Ponce (2007). Based on the most recent OAG data, supplied by airlines, Spirit is the second-largest operator to the US in any respect three airports this July-September (Q3). Only JetBlue is larger.
Photo: Spirit.
Spirit’s Puerto Rico capability has grown significantly recently. OAG indicates Spirit has 381,000 one-way seats on the market within the examined quarter. It has increased by a substantial 45% versus its previous July-September record, held in 2022, and by a whopping 150% versus pre-pandemic 2019.
As Spirit has expanded faster than Puerto Rico as a complete, it now has a 21% share of the mainland market, up by two percentage points year-on-year.
Image: GCMap.
Five recent routes
Spirit’s Puerto Rico presence has been helped by five recent routes, as summarised below, 4 of which have already began. None have been operated by the ULCC before. Note that Frontier served San Juan-O’Hare until 2022, while it inaugurated Dallas Fort Price on May 4th – the day before Spirit.
Photo: Vincenzo Pace | Easy Flying.
16 routes this July-September
Spirit’s 16-strong route network in these three months is as extensive as JetBlue but is one in need of Frontier (17). As shown below, San Juan-Orlando is by Spirit’s most-served route. It’s considered one of 4 operators on it. Indeed, all 16 of its routes have direct competition.
Spirit’s July-September flights |
Routing |
---|---|
Five each day |
San Juan-Orlando |
Double each day |
Aguadilla-Orlando, San Juan-Baltimore, Fort Lauderdale, Newark |
Every day |
Aguadilla-Fort Lauderdale, Ponce-Orlando, San Juan-Atlanta, Chicago O’Hare, Boston, Dallas Fort Price, Detroit, Miami, Philadelphia, Tampa |
Three weekly |
San Juan-Hartford |
* One-way, maximum variety of flights |
Mainland routes cut
Examining Spirit’s Puerto Rico network since 2004 shows that, of mainland routes, it previously operated San Juan to Atlantic City (in 2021/2022) and Recent York LaGuardia (2021/2022). It also flew Aguadilla-Philadelphia (in 2022) and Ponce-Fort Lauderdale (2007/2008). All 4 remain unserved.
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Where would you want Spirit to fly next from Puerto Rico? Tell us within the comments.