News & Press

  Summary indicators:

• Capacity, measured in available seat kilometers (ASK), grew 3.6% year-on-year
• Demand, measured in revenue passenger kilometers (RPK), increased 7.3% year-on-year
• Average load factor reached 83.9%, up 2.9 percentage points versus March 2025

Air traffic in March 2026: key highlights:

• Regional air traffic reached 43.1 million passengers in March.
• The domestic market accounted for 54.5% of total traffic, while international traffic represented 45.5%.

• Extra-regional traffic grew at a slower pace than intra-regional traffic.
• Extra-regional traffic increased 0.8%, in a month when traffic between Latin America and the United States declined 2.8%.

• Traffic with the United States shifted direction in March.
• Traffic declined 2.8% year-on-year after two months of growth, mainly affected by the contraction in the Mexico–United States market (-11.6%).

• The decline in traffic between Mexico and the United States was reflected in leisure destinations.
• Passenger flows between the United States and Cancún fell 11.5%, while traffic between the United States and San José del Cabo declined 9.2%.

• Intra-regional growth was accompanied by stronger connectivity.
• Traffic increased 10.7% year-on-year, with markets such as Argentina–Brazil growing 29.8% and expanding connectivity to 32 airport pairs, seven more than a year earlier.

• Some markets posted declines in March.
• Mexico fell 3.2%, Chile 1.9%, and Bolivia 11.5%, with declines concentrated in domestic traffic.

• Rising fuel prices are once again putting pressure on industry costs.
  • For the week ending May 1, the average jet fuel price in Latin America and the Caribbean reached USD 4.36 per gallon, nearly double the average recorded during 2025, in line with the upward pressure on refined fuel prices driven by the conflict in Iran and the resulting disruptions to transit through the Strait of Hormuz.

“March confirms that the region’s growth is being driven from within: eight out of every ten additional passengers during the quarter traveled within Latin America and the Caribbean, with markets such as Argentina–Brazil growing 29.8%. Sustaining this momentum, in a context where the conflict in Iran and the consequent restrictions in the Strait of Hormuz have pressured the rise in fuel prices, requires avoiding measures that further increase the cost of air travel and preserving the connectivity that supports regional development,” said Peter Cerdá, CEO of ALTA.

The full analysis, including country-level detail, international markets and new routes, is available at: ALTA Traffic Report – March 2026.

Glossary: RPK (Revenue Passenger Kilometers): number of paying passengers transported multiplied by the distance flown | ASK (Available Seat Kilometers): number of seats available for sale multiplied by the distance flown | Load Factor: obtained by dividing RPK by ASK.

Methodological Note

In this document, Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) is defined as the combined total of South America, Central America, the Caribbean, and Mexico. This definition is applied consistently across all regional and international traffic analyses.

Domestic traffic refers to flights operated within the same country. International traffic is classified into two broad segments:

• Intra-regional international traffic: flights between countries within LAC (e.g., Argentina–Brazil or Mexico–Colombia).
• Extra-regional international traffic: flights between LAC and other regions of the world, such as North America, Europe, Asia-Pacific, the Middle East, or Africa.