A JetBlue Airways plane lands near the air traffic control tower at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport on October 7, 2025 in Fort Lauderdale, Florida.
Joe Radle | Getty Images
jet blue airlines is already the largest airline in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, and wants to get even bigger.
“Lauderdale is a star for us,” JetBlue President Marty St. George said earlier this month of Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport.
Leveraging growth at Broward County Airport will be key as JetBlue revamps its network and rolls out more upscale options, such as domestic first-class cabins, to return to profitability. The last quarter it turned a profit was two years ago.
JetBlue had been looking to expand in Fort Lauderdale even before the South Florida-based airport’s No. 1 discount company, Spirit Airlines, filed for bankruptcy on May 2 under the weight of debt and years of snowballing problems.
JetBlue is now the airport’s top airline with a 36% market share based on capacity, up from about 24% a year ago, according to Cirium’s 2026 capacity tally. Cirium said JetBlue increased its capacity by 5% between May and June of this year, but major competitors withdrew during Florida’s off-season.
According to Cirium data, the company plans to fly an average of about 106 flights a day this year, up from about 68 flights a day last year.
Just hours after Spirit’s collapse, JetBlue and other airlines made their own travel plans, adding flights to fill empty seats in Fort Lauderdale.
JetBlue on June 1 raised its sales forecast for the year, citing strong demand.
“We’re feeling very bullish about the customer response to JetBlue’s growth,” St. George said.
JetBlue said it plans further growth as additional gates become available after Spirit’s demise. Some of those gates are still tied up in bankruptcy court.
JetBlue’s plan is to operate approximately 150 daily flights from Fort Lauderdale during the busy winter season, including President’s Day weekend and some school holidays, a schedule comparable to Boston Logan International Airport, JetBlue’s second-largest hub after New York.
The plan includes more international destinations departing from Fort Lauderdale and an emphasis on premium air travel.
St. George said the company is considering a location in Fort Lauderdale for a third lounge in its network to accommodate those customers. It already has lounges in New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport and Boston.
“At this point, we don’t know where the lounge will be located,” he said. “I think the airport community would like to build a lounge there as well. Certainly given the size of our business and the number of premium customers that come in and out of Fort Lauderdale, I think (it) makes a lot of sense. We just need to find the right location.”
A major competitive threat lies at Miami International Airport, about 42 miles south. american airlines A hub that dwarfs Fort Lauderdale. Both airports, Miami being much larger, are major hubs for leisure passengers as well as those visiting friends and relatives in Latin America and the Caribbean.
“We have a significant number of customers for whom Miami is the right airport and they will never leave Miami, but we are not going to convert those customers,” St. George said. “As Fort Lauderdale expands its destinations, I think the usefulness of Lauderdale Airport will increase as more services become available.”
American Airlines announced Friday that it plans to fly to a record 100 destinations from the United States to airports in the Caribbean, Mexico and other Latin American countries, with 77 flights departing from Miami, including new flights to Maracaibo, Venezuela, starting July 14 and Cap-Haitien, Haiti, starting November 1.
JetBlue Airways recently announced service between Fort Lauderdale and Caracas as the airline increases its frequency. American Airlines announced in January that it would resume flights from the United States to Venezuela for the first time since 2019, weeks after the United States detained Venezuela’s president.
