Direct vs Non-stop

[tomcat]

Okay, if we're going to have a travel forum....here's how the airline industry uses these terms....

A direct flight is a flight that operates between two cities, but has stops along the way. It will have the same flight number, and most of the time you will remain on the same aircraft, but won't have to connect to another flight. You could buy a ticket for flight 1549 BWI-PHX, but the flight actually operates BWI-MDW-OMA-DEN-PHX. That's direct.

A non-stop flight does not stop at intermediate airports. This is where flight 1549 only operates BWI-PHX without stopping.

Now back to your regularly scheduled programming.


In all seriousness, I'm glad we have this sub-forum now. Lots of good things to chat about in the world of travel.

 

[G-Man]

 

[tahoebum]

How common are direct flights? I’ve been flying 12-15 round trips a year for the last 25 years and have only been on two direct flights and a good chunk of my flights have not been non-stop. My wife has logged over 2 million miles with Delta and only remembers about a dozen direct flights.

 

[tomcat]

Really, direct flights are less common amongst legacy carriers (AA, UA, DL) that operate a hub and spoke operation, as most multi-segment flights will just be connecting to another flight. SWA was built on short haul, multi-city, point-to-point flights, so it was very common here. Over the past twenty years, while we're mostly non-stop, since it's still a point-to-point network, directs are still fairly common.

So, if you're wanting to fly MDW-PHX, there's non-stop as well as direct options.

 

[neophyteguy]

I have flown many miles in the last 20 or so years, most internationally as I lived in Australia. i've actually never been on a direct flight, but am sure it would be less onerous than switching planes. I usually book by total travel time when booking longer flights, so maybe that negates the issue somewhat.

 

[OGputtnfool]

I think you should have said, "... let's educate everyone on how airlines use certain terminology" because while that is most definitely the way the air travel industry defines direct, that's not the way the word is defined for every day usage.

direct
adjective

Definition of direct (Entry 2 of 3)

1a : proceeding from one point to another in time or space without deviation or interruption : straight a direct line
b : proceeding by the shortest way the direct route

This is definitely good to know though. I'm not sure I ever realized there was a difference. Maybe just thought it was a different term used for the same meaning.

 

[tomcat]

Fair enough. I modified the first statement to better reflect my intent.

 

[GolfTravelDude]

The only time I have seen these terms is via Southwest....They do it a lot.