Fewer Americans are flying: TSA screenings fall 4.1% in the week to Nov. 5, the biggest drop in five weeks

Air travel is softening as the holiday season approaches. Adding up the daily numbers on TSA's checkpoint travel numbers page and comparing them with the same weekdays on the 2025 page (364 days earlier, so Mondays line up with Mondays), the Transportation Security Administration screened 15,695,283 people from October 30 to November 5. A year earlier the same seven days drew 16,363,515. That is 668,232 fewer, or 4.1% lower.

It extends the trend in our October 20 report, when the week to October 19 ran about 2% below last year, and it is the largest weekly decline in the five weeks we calculated.

The five weeks

For the whole of October (October 1 to 31, against the matching 31 days in 2025) TSA counted 77,586,900 people against 78,929,487, down 1.7% or about 1.34 million.

One day did a lot of the damage

Don't read all of the 4.1% as a sudden collapse. Saturday, October 31 was the outlier: 1,686,878 screenings against 2,029,708 on the matching Saturday last year, a gap of 342,830 or 16.9%. Take that day out of both weeks and the other six days are down about 2.3% (14,008,405 against 14,333,807). We checked the calendar only: Halloween fell on a Saturday this year and a Friday last year. TSA does not publish reasons for daily swings and we have not found a verified explanation, so treat the cause as unknown.

Even without that day, every day from Sunday, November 1 to Thursday, November 5 ran below last year (down 5.5%, 1.9%, 2.5%, 2.5% and 3.5%), and only Friday, October 30 was up, by 3.0%.

Why it matters for anyone booking a trip

Fewer people flying while fares are higher is a price signal, not just a traffic statistic. Our earlier reports covered Thanksgiving fares up 31% in Hopper's data as quoted by CNBC, and what higher airfares mean for businesses that send people on the road. Screenings alone cannot prove that price is the reason travelers are staying home; they only show the volume is lower.

• Holiday travelers: Thanksgiving is November 26. Last year TSA's busiest days around it were the Sunday after (3,134,613 on November 30, 2025) and the Monday after (2,893,451), and the Wednesday before drew 2,753,036. Thanksgiving Day itself was the quietest at 1,559,165. If you have flexibility, the day itself and the Tuesday before (2,675,261 last year, still below the Wednesday and Sunday peaks) are the least crowded.
• Waiting for a fare drop: softer volume is a reason airlines might discount, but nothing in the TSA data tells us they will,. We would not bet a trip on it. If your dates are fixed, compare the fare you can get today with what a fare alert shows and book when you have a price you can live with. Our cheap flights guide covers tracking and the 24-hour cancellation rule.
• Companies with travel budgets: if your travelers are flying less, check whether that is a choice or whether the fare approvals are not catching up with prices. Two months of 2% to 4% fewer passengers across the country is a small number for one firm, but it is a useful check against your own trip count.

What to watch

TSA updates its page Monday to Friday by 9 a.m. and warns holiday-week updates can be slightly delayed. The next test is the week to November 12 and then the Thanksgiving run, where the year-ago peaks above are the benchmark. If November 29 and 30 come in under last year's 3.13 million and 2.89 million, that would confirm the softening has reached the holiday itself.

Sources: TSA checkpoint travel numbers, 2026 and 2025, read November 8, 2026 (the 2026 page ran through November 5). Weekly and monthly totals, percentage changes and the Halloween observation are our own arithmetic, comparing each day with the day 364 days earlier. TSA numbers count checkpoint screenings, not tickets sold or flights flown. This is market information, not investment advice.