Southwest Airlines Co

southwest.com

What Do They Do?

Provides scheduled passenger air transportation in the United States and near-international markets.

How Do They Make Money?

Passengers buy tickets before travel; Southwest earns fares and flight-related services when the flight takes place. Other revenue also includes nontravel goods exchanged for loyalty points and monthly marketing services for a credit-card partner.

FY2025 revenue by product or service revenue

Segment	Share	How money arrives
Passenger Sold outright	91% FY2022: 90%	Sold outright
Freight	0.6% FY2022: 0.7%
Other Mix	8.4% FY2022: 9.4%	Mix

Who Are Their Customers?

Passengers buy fares mainly through Southwest.com and the Southwest App; online travel agencies and airline partners also sell Southwest tickets and itineraries.

Do Revenues Turn Into Profits?

Yes. It kept 2 cents of every revenue dollar as net income in FY2025, but spent more cash than it brought in: free cash flow was −$831M.

Operating income, FY2025

2% of revenue

▲ +33% vs FY2024 ($321M, 1%)

Net income, FY2025

2% of revenue

▼ −5% vs FY2024 ($465M, 2%)

Free cash flow, FY2025

−3% of revenue

▼ −48% (Loss) vs FY2024 (−$1.6B, −6%)

How Are They Changing?

Since the FY2025 annual report

Latest quarter: Q3 FY2026, the three months to Sep 30, 2026

Revenue: ▲ +21%; vs $6.9B in Q3 FY2025
Net income: ▲ +400%; vs $54M in Q3 FY2025

Passenger share of revenue vs 90.9% in Q3 FY2025

Growing. Revenue grew 78% in 4 years, from $15.8B in FY2021 to $28.1B in FY2025, about 15% a year.

Fare products Southwest replaced its earlier Wanna Get Away, Anytime, and Business Select fare lineup with Basic, Choice, Choice Preferred, and Choice Extra, and introduced bag fees for most fare products.

Revenue over time

Passenger Freight Other

$50B$25B$0

FY2021 FY2022 FY2023 FY2024 FY2025

Who Do They Compete With?

Competes with American Airlines, Delta Air Lines, and United Airlines

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