UPDATE: We are on the eve of the new baggage fees taking effect, and an internal memo has just revealed how much Southwest Airlines will charge for checked bags:
- 1st bag: $35
- 2nd bag: $45
Passengers who will still enjoy free checked bags include:
- Southwest Business Select fares (two free checked bags)
- Southwest A-List Preferred members (two free checked bags)
- Southwest A-List members (one free checked bag)
- Southwest co-branded credit card holders (one free checked bag)
If you read on below, you’ll see I called the changes “suicide” for the Dallas-based airline. While I hope I was being overdramatic, I still predict that these changes will not ultimately help the carrier’s bottom line.
As late as last year, Southwest insisted that although it would collect $1.5 billion from baggage fees, it would lose $1.8 billion in market share if it introduced these fees. The only change has been an activist investor (Elliott) that is adamant about juicing up the short-term stock price for Southwest.
I wish Southwest the best because more competition is good for everyone…but I still think this is the wrong move at the wrong time and that removing the DNA that made Southwest unique will not work when Southwest lacks an international route network and key partnerships that its competitors enjoy.
Will baggage fees change the way you fly Southwest Airlines?
My original story is below.
As Elliott Investment Management continues to turn Southwest Airlines upside down, the carrier’s most fundamental differentiator will soon be eliminated: Southwest will no longer offer free checked baggage.
Southwest Airlines Will Charge For Checked Bags Starting May 28, 2025
To borrow the timeless words of Vin Scully, “In a year that has been so improbable, the impossible has happened!” While every other US carrier cut free checked baggage, Southwest has resisted the trend. Even facing fierce pressure to perform better by hostile minority shareholder Elliott Investment Management, it has maintained that “Bags Fly Free” is a core company value and that eliminating that benefit would do far more harm than help.
But the Dallas-based carrier has had a change of heart. For tickets booked on or after May 28, 2025, Southwest a new baggage policy will apply:
- Rapid Rewards A-List Preferred members + customers traveling on Business Select fares will continue to enjoy two free checked bags
- Rapid Rewards A-List members + Rapid Rewards credit card holders will receive a credit for one free checked bag
- All other passengers will face baggage fees for both a first and second checked bag
The carrier describes these changes as, “Southwest. Even Better. We’re transforming our business to offer you more choices. You can count on us to continue to offer you low fares, convenient flights to destinations you want, and a travel experience that is rewarding. Complete with our friendly, award-winning hospitality!”
Of course, CEO Bob Jordan, who appears absolutely desperate to hold on to his job, also gaslights loyal Southwest customers by trying to explain away these changes:
“We have tremendous opportunity to meet current and future Customer needs, attract new Customer segments we don’t compete for today, and return to the levels of profitability that both we and our Shareholders expect. We will do all this while remaining focused on what’s made us strong — our People and the authentic, friendly, and award-winning Customer Service only they can provide.”
I find this all so short-sighted and I am not even a Southwest customer (and will certainly not be one now). Elliott has treated Southwest like it is in bankruptcy when the carrier continues to be profitable. Rather than trying to see whether assigned seating, redeye flights, and new partnerships would bolster profitability, Southwest is essentially cutting off its nose to spite its face.
CONCLUSION
For tickets booked on or after May 28, 2025, Southwest Airlines will begin charging checked baggage fees… reversing a core promise that has set Southwest apart from its competition.
I predict that this will not end well for Southwest. Wait and see (I’d even be happy to admit that I am wrong). You cannot shed your identity–your very heart–and expect people to keep choosing your carrier. With its lack of partners, longhaul flights, and premium cabins, Southwest always had to win customers a different way. Now, under an incredibly short-sighted attempt to juice up the short-term stock price (that will not work either…), Southwest is eliminating the very features that made people fiercely loyal.
What’s next, Elliott saying that due to poor performance it will need to sell assets like slots and aircraft?
Southwest Airlines is dead. Long live Elliott…
image: Southwest
Without a First Class and GA seating, were they ever a premium carrier? They priced themselves as one, but never offered the potential experience.
To me they were always another Allegiant, Spirit, Frontier, etc that I would never consider. But obviously many did, just not in a way to make them financially solvent.
But we may be saving the same thing about every US airline a year from now and debating if a government bailout is needed.
No. More. Bailouts.
There will surely be massive bailouts as the economy crashes. But only to those airlines who pucker up and suck.
United and Delta are well positioned for the requisite suction.
if there were no bailouts when covid hit, AA and UA would have filed bankruptcy within days.
DL and WN pulled down billions in lines of credit
so, yes, end the bailouts.
but remember that WN still has one of the strongest balance sheets in the global airline industry.
Elliott is trying to monetize it but WN has more than enough financial firepower to stick through another downturn or two.
AA, OTOH,….
Agreed.
Not only checked bags. They gutted every benefit to flying southwest. They are devaluing award redemptions, and making flight credits have an expiration date. Living in chicago, I fly them a fair amount, but that’s going to end unless they are the only option.
I’m addressing thos additional changes next, but felt a post dedicated to the baggage charges was warrnated.
Imagine not having to deal with the hassle of DFW and IAH. DAL and HOU are the BUR and LGB of Texas. Southwest is convenient.
May not be suicide. If I were tasked to run Southwest starting tomorrow. I would keep all the proposed changes. However, it is not clear which fares will have one free checked bag. I would make it free except for Wanna Get Away fares. The WGA Plus fare would have that free one checked bag.
I fly Southwest about 2.5 to 5% of the time.
Exactly, it seems madness to not offer a standard fare with one bag included as an incentive for people to buy up and avoid bringing all their possessions onboard.
They are the dominant carrier at BWI near me, but stopped flying them a long time ago and drive out of my way to DCA or fly BWI on AA or US usually as Southwest now usually are most expensive by a decent amount even factoring in price to pay for checked luggage on other carriers. This change will hurt them as I think many would pay the premium price just for the idea they did not have to worry about paying fees at airport and may not pick check others. That will change now.
Agreed.
Same, BWI is closest airport and we stopped flying Southwest because of the price gouging. My wife just priced round-trip to RDU, about an hour flight Southwest wanted $540 from BWI. United from Dulles was $230. Southwest has been dead to us for years.
Question for more knowledgable readers: why are free or at least inexpensive checked bags so unpopular with carriers? A lot of my flying is on (U)LCCs, not by choice but because they happen to have the routes and schedules I need. No I don’t enjoy them, but one thing they do right is pricing checked bags cheaper than carry-ons, which makes boarding and deboarding nicer and faster, eases flight attendant work during boarding, and speeds turnarounds. Given those advantages, I would have expected full service carriers to sit up and take notice, not because I like free checked bags but because they presumably like efficiency.
Granted, full service carriers are not run by fools, so if they’re not doing it, they must know something I don’t. What am I missing?
I think that in the USA the idea is to try and get the punters sign up for the airline credit card in order to get a bag included. Being from Europe, I think that’s completely daft and indeed dangerous considering that they don’t impose weight limits on carry ons (who wants to risk 20kg of stuff landing on their shoulder?).
Here in Europe, it’s not unusual for luggage charges to exceed the cost of the fare. Using a Lufthansa fare that includes a bag and taking advantage of my *G status to check another one virtually always works out cheaper than flying easyJet/Jet2 with checked bags.
Thank you — good point!
Elliot “Investment” Management is doing anything but. Moral has to be in the dumper. Their slogan “Wanna Get Away” is more of a phrase they seem to be telling their soon to be loyal fliers…to another carrier. This will make a great business school case studyin the future on what not to do.
How will these changes affect reward tickets? And if two are booked on the same reservation number with a cobranded credit card, will each get a free bag?
We are still waiting for more details – both good questions.
Still have not heard if additional passengers on the same confirmation number will get a free checked bag. But, I called about companion pass passengers and the answer is the companion does not get a free bag because they have a different confirmation number.
It seems like they are trying to become UA or AA, but without first class and with a different route network. We will see if that works. But if it doesn’t, I’d love to see the US big 3 picking up some of their routes.
Sick and tired of these CEOs and their C-suite lackeys gaslighting their customers with new changes that only hurt their base by telling us how great and “transformative” they are. And you wonder why Luigi Mangione took his anger on one?
Because he was a piece of sh#t lunatic looking to blame everyone but himself why he failed in life. Only thing worse than him is the lunatics that support him because of the same qualities he has.
As for me, I’ll personally enjoy the day he is shot, electrocuted or injected once the Federal Government gets off their rear and charges him. Zero faith NY will hold him responsible.
Yikes. You really need help. Not at all surprised but yeesh you are a miserable heap of humanity. Troll or not.
So we found that Luigi Hanes Grazer that wants to bl#w the POS. Hopefully things turn around for you!
How’s the work at Elliot Investment Management turning out for you, C-Suiter?
RIP Southwest. Southwest won my business with two free checked bags. When I was working I flew Southwest as much as possible/practical.
Once Southwest implements checked bags, especially for first checked bag, Southwest will not be meaningfully different from other air carriers in the USA and Canada. There will be no more reason why I should pick Southwest over other air carriers, all other things being equal.
I have not had occasion to fly anywhere since the 4th of May 2021. Should I find it necessary to fly somewhere again in the future I will look at the big picture and see what ALL carriers going wherever I might need to go charge when factoring in fees such as however many checked bags I need as well as if there is a charge for a carry on. I might even look at what Spirit and/or Frontier charge with their bundled fares.
I would like to see government intervention such as punitive taxes on ancillary fees such as first and second checked bag fees and any fees to use the overhead bin for carry on items with a clause prohibiting airlines from passing on the added costs to the consumer but instead a requirement that either eat the additional costs or else rescind the fees.
Didn’t Southwest exist for decades competing against the other airlines when nobody charged for checked bags? SW still was successful. Checked bags were not even a factor in purchasing or choosing an airline.
Times change.
“Change of heart”. Pun intended?
Oh yes. 😉
Well done. Wonder how many readers picked up on that.
“SUICIDE” and “Southwest Airlines is dead.” Lucky for you click-bait is alive and well. You seem to know a lot for someone who does’t fly them. I also love in the comments where you engage with a commenter who says they “fly BWI on AA or US usually”. Remind me – where is US Airways flying to these days?
Suicide attempts do not always lead to death…maybe Southwest will be lucky.
But the Southwest of HK is dead.
Elliott must really want Southwest dead to keep pushing on initiatives like this that will destroy the airline.
No seatback IFE, no power ports in over 75% of the fleet, no premium cabins, no real food options, no partners, no lounges, and yet they want to charge the same prices as the big 3 (and AS and B6). Why would anyone want to fly them again?
The gate agents and flight attendants are going to catch a lot of flack about this from unhappy flyers when they are told they need to check their oversize bag or have too many to carry on.
suicide is a little extreme… actually alot extreme.
WN has been subsidizing alot of American’s trips to LAS and Florida for years by giving away far more than what it cost to produce those services.
They needed to restructure their free bags and give them only to people that pay the highest fares and they need to sell seats that are comparable to other airlines – no first row for people that act handicapped while loyal business passengers end up behind the wing.
That said, WN has to replace alot of passengers they once carried and those for whom the new price of travel is too high with other customers… that is not a very easy task in this environment.
but let’s also remember that AA is less profitable than WN.
and UA’s profits will fall when they add in multiple new labor contracts to pay their people comparable to what AA, DL and WN are paying now.
There’s a chance that they will survive. They may use the model of Alaska Airlines.
Alaska Airlines is known to have FA’s that are about 5% more friendly. Alaska is not over the top friendly but just fewer grouchy FA’s. Alaska doesn’t have much in their first class, just the usual 1990’s style domestic first class seats.
survival is probably pretty certain… they have a very strong balance sheet and they are more profitable than AA which is highly leveraged.
Lots of people forget that it takes years to produce 750 shipsets of first class seats but WN can and will move the pitch of the seats they already have on their entire fleet in about 6 months.
The real risk to WN is the whiplash as customers experience the changes, many of which will not happen smoothly given the sheer volume.
WN has enormous staying power and they will probably have to draw on it during the transition which might happen a whole lot faster than some of us assume.
and those first class seats might already be on order – along w/ some 787-10s.
Southwest’s market will become short haul flights to smaller airports and travelers with up to two nights on the road. No need for checked bags.
Sounds like Allegiant.
A friendly reminder. Everyone have phones fully charged. Since I don’t fly southwest, the ensuing chaos should make for some great video!
SW has lost me permanently as a customer. Anything good about the airline is dead.