ITA Airways achieves its first profitable year in its short history

2025 has been the year in which ITA Airways has marked its first positive operating margin. The airline achieved a positive net result of 209 million euros in 2025, with a positive EBIT of 25 million euros, increasing by 22 million compared to 2024. However, there is more to talk about, scraping below the surface.

In this post:

• 2025 Financial Performance
• The contrast in the number of flights and revenue
• A positive outlook, but still issues to be sorted

ITA Airways 2025 Financial Performance

In terms of operating results, it has been a very successful year for ITA Airways. Although the operating margin has been positive by a mere 1% more or less, this is a significant milestone in the Italian airline's history.

2024 had shown promising results with a positive EBIT of €3 million. In 2025, however, the airline achieved a net positive result of 209 million euros. That is a big and major change to prior performance, where ITA Airways and Alitalia before it had consistently lost money and cost the Italian taxpayer significant amounts of money.

However, there's more to the story than just those 209 million euros. ITA Airways achieves growth in passenger-related revenue, which doesn't account for the total 436 million euro increase in net positive result. From its passenger operations, ITA Airways generated a 25 million euro positive result before tax and interest.

The remaining 184 million euros to reach the total positive result of 209 came from non-flight related items. Specifically, ITA Airways benefited greatly from the strength of the Euro in comparison to the US dollar. That's because the Italian airline has most of its debt denominated in U.S. dollars and not in euros.

The contrast in the number of flights and revenue

Looking at ITA Airways' press release, you can notice immediately that there is a contrast in the reduction of the number of flights and the increase in revenue from passenger operations.

ITA Airways flew fewer flights in 2025 compared to 2024, 123,000, with a reduction of 11% compared to the prior year. Despite this, the airline achieved a higher load factor and revenue from flight operations.

This is not at all uncommon in airlines when they find themselves in situations where they are forced to reduce flights. Often you see the carriers increasing their efficiency in filling flights and selling at high fares their tickets.

In 2025, load factor increased by 2.1 percentage points compared to 2024, reaching 83.4% up from 81.3%. Passenger numbers also decreased slightly, but less compared to the reduction in total flights. 2025 saw the airline carry 16.2 million passengers, while 2024 ended with 17.6 million passengers carried.

That boils down to a 2.7% increase in revenue from passenger operations despite an 11% decrease in flights. Therefore, RSAK jumped massively from 2024 into 2025.

The main reason for ITA Airways reducing the number of flights is primarily due to the reliability and durability problems associated with the Pratt and Whitney GTF engines. Pratt and Whitney GTF being the primary being the primary engine and engine supplier for the ITA Airways fleet.

A positive outlook, but still issues to be sorted

ITA's 2025 financial performance is to be seen as a starting point for the carrier. A first stepping stone towards achieving consistent sustainability over the years.

ITA Airways CEO, Eberhart, also stressed there are still issues to be solved before being able to achieve consistent sustainability in financial results.

Fleet renovation has helped massively to achieve positive operating margins. Lower fuel burns have helped the airline to keep costs at bay, especially as the cost of aviation fuel is becoming more of an issue.

Another issue which is being looked at and will be tackled is the still too high cost of leasing aircraft which ITA is facing at the moment. This, at the moment, is front of mind for the Lufthansa group and ITA Airways management.

Another top priority is entering the joint venture A++ with Lufthansa, United Airlines and Air Canada. A move which would allow ITA to aggressively tackle the transatlantic flight market.