American Airlines is making a major change to how it operates. The Fort Worth based carrier is fundamentally changing the way it does business at Dallas Fort Worth International Airport (DFW), the airline’s largest hub, and the airline’s customers will soon benefit from those changes in a meaningful way.
American Restructures Flight Banks at DFW
DFW Airport serves a whopping 100,000 passengers each day. As American’s largest hub it connects passengers to destinations around the globe. More customers and more bags travel and connect through DFW every day than any other airport in American’s network. According to the airline, “when DFW runs well, American runs well.”
Because of this, American is restructuring its DFW hub in an effort to make things easier for passengers. Historically, American has operated nine “banks” at DFW where passengers are able to make their connections.
Beginning in April, American’s DFW operation is evolving to a 13-bank structure. This will be reflected in the carrier’s schedule as of December 27, 2025 and is intended to provide more certainty to travelers. When discussing the changes, Jim Moses, Senior Vice President of DFW Operations at American, said this:
“As the operating environment and our customers’ expectations have evolved in the last 10 years, our approach at our largest and most impactful hub must also evolve. We’re making this significant shift while maintaining the same breadth, depth and schedule quality our customers expect and depend on. That means good things for American’s customers, our team members and just about everyone who depends on the airline.”
With this structural schedule change, customers should benefit from more improved early morning departure times compared to 2025. Specifically, they will experience more departure options in highly desired time windows and fewer early morning departures to DFW, which is especially good news for customers making morning connections through DFW.
American is Maximizing the Connection Experience
While American is working to maximize the connecting experience in DFW, I wouldn’t be surprised to see some of these items make their way to other American hubs. According to the carrier, it will make the following adjustments:
- Improved customer connection times: While customers will still have the flexibility to book tight connections when time matters, especially for business travelers, the schedule enhancements provide more options for a stress-free experience. American’s new structure at DFW reduces the concentration of very short connection times, creating more balance that offers customers greater confidence when planning their journey. This should give you more time to visit the lounges.
- More connection opportunities: The new bank structure keeps nearly all existing connection opportunities in addition to creating new opportunities across the airline’s main hub airport.
- It’s great for bags, too: Just as customer connections will improve, so, too, will checked bag connections. That means even more bags arriving with customers, and in many cases, arriving ahead of customers. American has doubled down on checked bag management over the past few years, and this fundamental shift at DFW further strengthens the work already being experienced by customers.
- Airspace efficiency: What’s good on the ground is also good in the air. By reflowing American’s DFW schedule, the airline is helping make the airspace around the DFW metroplex even more efficient, meaning fewer air traffic delays and more on-time departures and arrivals for customers.
As someone that lived in DFW for years and regularly flew American, I would take some of these developments with a grain of salt. However, this is a clear move by American to improve the customer experience at its largest airport.
American Upgrades the Ground Experience at DFW Airport
The changes to the flight banks are the most recent upgrade for passengers traveling through, from, or to Americans largest hub. In addition to the changes outlined above, American is dramatically increasing its footprint at DFW with the construction of additional gates in Terminals A and C as well as building the all new Terminal F.
Once completed, American will occupy all 31 gates in the new terminal, which is intended to become the airline’s primary international gateway. These upgrades include dedicated premium lounges, Flagship check-in and a new U.S. Customs facility.
Summary
American Airlines is making a major investment in its DFW fortress hub with the addition of four new daily flight banks. In addition to the modified schedule, American is making some additional improvements that should help passengers traveling through its largest hub.
While I have done my best to avoid American as much as possible in recent years, I’m still excited to see them making an effort to become a more premium, passenger friendly airline.
As someone who has flown AA through DFW many times, the tight connections are bad, but the worst part is how they will give away your seat on the connection if your inbound flight is even a few minutes late on paper. The train at the airport takes about 20 minutes end to end, and I suspect a bit longer with an added terminal, so if you have a 40-minute connection and aren’t lucky with gates, it only gives you about 20 minutes to transit. If you can get off the plane quickly, it’s crazy.