Travel is down at Oakland airport

Despite OAK changing its name to boost business, spiking jet fuel costs and higher ticket prices are dampening travel demand.

Oakland changed its airport’s name last year to entice more people to use its services, but that hasn’t stopped passenger travel from declining.

According to Oakland San Francisco Bay Airport spokesperson Kaley Skantz, the airport saw a 17% drop in passengers when comparing May 2025 to May 2026. Over the past 12 months, airport passenger traffic declined by a monthly average of 14.8%.

According to airport data, there were a total of 693,356 passengers in May, down from 842,792 a year ago.

Market analysts on Wall Street and international travel associations have noted that fuel prices have skyrocketed since the advent of the U.S.-Iran-Israel war earlier this year, with crude oil rising over 50% at times and jet fuel doubling to $197 a barrel.

Southwest Airlines, one of the main carriers at the Oakland Airport, joined seven other airlines in raising prices in the last few months. Its CEO, Bob Jordan, said at an investor conference in May that the airline had not seen a slowdown in travel demand but that the fare increases it instituted would still cover increased fuel prices, squeezing their profit margin. Jordan also said that there had been seven consecutive fare increases by the industry since Feb. 1.

Alaska Air Group, which manages Alaska and Hawaiian airlines, two other major carriers at the Oakland airport, said recently that it also raised prices, including baggage fees. The CEO, Ben Minicucci, said it is likely fares will remain high even after oil prices fall.

Volaris, the Mexican airline serving destinations in Mexico from Oakland, also announced in April that it had raised prices and that, during the last quarter for which data was available, the average cost of fuel for its airplanes increased 16%.

Last month, the New York Times reported that domestic air fares in the U.S. had risen 35% overall this summer compared with last summer, and international fares had risen by about 15%.

Skantz told The Oaklandside that the year-over-year decrease in passengers at the Oakland airport began in 2024.

A recent study by Upgraded Points, a travel rewards news site, analyzed passenger throughput at U.S. airports overseen by the Transportation Security Administration and found a correlation with the drop in passengers reported at Oakland airport. They said that the “average daily TSA checkpoint throughput at San Francisco Bay Oakland International Airport (OAK) fell 13.0% between March and May 2026, compared to the same period in 2025.”

The study found that the reduction reflected “widespread screening disruptions and staffing shortages across the aviation system” due in part to the lapse in Homeland Security funding because of the government shutdown.

Skantz said the Oakland airport “did not see any significant impacts to operations as a result of the shutdown.”

TSA checkpoint throughput is an incomplete metric, said Skantz, because it only accounts for departing or arriving passengers, not the many people who use the airport as a transfer hub to another destination without going through TSA screening.

She stressed that the airport continues to add amenities to attract more flyers, including new restrooms, restaurants, and storefronts that highlight local businesses, such as a new Trader Vic’s expected to open later this year.