Demand for travel has been slow since the Covid pandemic, but it is picking up again.

In fact, according to the American Express 2025 Global Travel Trends Report, 74% of global respondents have plans to take between one and three domestic trips within the year, and 59% plan to take between one and three international trips.

As travel ramps up, business has been great for Delta Air Lines (although not necessarily for other airlines, many of which have continued to struggle). Delta recently reported record revenue in its earnings report for the second quarter of 2025.

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According to its most recent earnings report, the airline generated $1.8 billion in pretax operating profit. The earnings report also indicated that the airline led “network peers across key operational metrics.”

One reason why Delta Air Lines is doing well is that it is not flying as many unprofitable flights as some other carriers. When demand drops for flights, Delta has been efficient at making changes.

Now, one of those recent changes involves canceling certain flights that were planned for the upcoming winter season.

Delta Air Lines is canceling flights to a popular tourist destination

The flights Delta is canceling were headed to Tulum, Mexico. 

This area is a popular tourist destination for U.S. travelers, so when a new airport opened up there, airlines, including Delta, rushed to add nonstop flights during the winter season, when many people head to tropical destinations.

Related: Southwest Airlines cancels hundreds of flights from July to Sept.

Delta has decided to make a big change this winter, though. It’s canceling several flights it previously offered to Tulum, including:

• Saturday seasonal service from Minneapolis, St. Paul
• Saturday seasonal service from Detroit

This leaves only one nonstop flight heading to Tulum through Delta: a flight leaving out of Atlanta.

Delta Air Lines is not the only airline cutting back on Tulum flights

In canceling these flights, Delta Air Lines has joined a long list of airlines that are cutting back travel to the popular Mexican destination. Others that have dropped or reduced their flights include:

• American Airlines cut its flights from Charlotte, with nonstop flights now coming only from Dallas and Miami.
• JetBlue only offers a nonstop flight from JFK in New York City but will reduce the frequency of these flights.
• United Airlines has eliminated the Chicago O’Hare flight to Tulum, leaving only the flights from Houston-Intercontinental (IAH) and Newark (EWR).

The trend also exists outside of the United States, as Air Canada reduced capacity to Tulum by 29%.

Passengers will have far fewer options going to Tulum

Passengers across the board will have far fewer choices if they want to head to this Mexican vacation destination. In total, there will be around 27% fewer flights across all U.S. airlines flying there.

This will make it more difficult for those who want to visit and take a nonstop flight. 

It’s not immediately clear why flights to Tulum underperformed so much that airlines decided to reduce capacity by such a large margin.

More on travel:

• U.S. government issues serious warning for cruise passengers
• Delta Air Lines makes a baggage change that travelers will like
• United Airlines passenger incident triggers quick response

Thrifty Traveler reported that the problems may be either Tulum’s growth in popularity and travelers becoming fatigued of visiting the destination once it was more crowded.

It could also be the fact that the new airport was not as convenient as it seemed, since downtown Tulum is 37 minutes away from the airport and the main hotel is 50 minutes away.

Regardless of the reason for the change, Delta Air Lines flyers will now need to look for alternatives if they had hoped to travel nonstop to Tulum on one of the now-canceled flights. 

(The Arena Group will earn a commission if you book a trip.)

Make a free appointment with TheStreet’s Travel Agent Partner, Postcard Travel, or email Amy Post at amypost@postcardtravelplanning.com or call or text her at 386-383-2472.