United Airlines Teases New Routes: Could Bangkok Be In The Cards?!

If you ask me, United Airlines has by far the most interesting route network of any US carrier (United flies to the most destinations and most countries of any US carriers), and the airline keeps expanding. In recent years, United has made a game of allowing the public to guess new routes, and I sure enjoy playing along. Here’s the latest example of that.

United plans to announce new routes

United will be announcing new routes at 8AM ET on Wednesday, April 2, 2025. United has posted a 30-second video on social media about this announcement. The video is much simpler than many of the past “clue” videos that we’ve seen from United. It simply shows the globe, with a particular focus on Asia and the South Pacific, and there’s a mention of “new dots” coming soon.

Just to contrast this to past videos, below is a similar video we saw around the same time last year, for new route announcements at the time. It was Indiana Jones themed, and featured Patrick Quayle, United’s SVP of Global Network Planning and Alliances.

What new routes will United introduce?

For some general context, United sometimes has two big route announcements per year, as it relates to long haul flights. Typically in the fall, United announces new transatlantic flying for summer, while in the spring, United sometimes announces new long haul winter flying. Typically the fall announcement is bigger than the spring announcement.

Really the only thing we have to go off here is the map that United provides. It’s zoomed in on Asia and the South Pacific, and I’d assume that’s intended to be the clue. It’s possible that I’m missing something, but I think that all the dots shown are existing or already announced United destinations.

United has an excess of long haul aircraft in winter, given all the European destinations that are summer seasonal. China demand hasn’t fully come back, and on top of that, United’s Australia and New Zealand expansion a couple of years ago didn’t prove as profitable as the airline hoped.

United already has an impressive network in Asia, so what could the airline add next? I only have one semi-educated guess. I have to imagine that United will finally launch a flight from San Francisco (SFO) to Bangkok (BKK), perhaps as a winter seasonal service. Air Canada launched a seasonal flight from Vancouver (YVR) a couple of years back, and it has seemingly been a success, since it has been brought back, and even expanded.

I have to imagine that United will do the same, and the timing is no coincidence, given The White Lotus. After all, in past seasons, we’ve seen significant increases in demand to destinations after The White Lotus was filmed. I could be totally wrong, but put me down for that.