Southwest Airlines ripped over controversial new plus-size passenger policy: ‘Worse for everybody’

This change didn’t sit well with some.

Southwest Airlines’ popular “pick you own” seat perk isn’t the only policy on the chopping block. The budget carrier announced that a new measure that may require plus-size passengers to fork over extra dough.

Starting January 27, 2026, flyers who “encroach upon the neighboring seat” will be required to purchase an extra seat in advance, CBS News reported.

“To ensure space, we are communicating to Customers who have previously used the extra seat policy that they should purchase it at booking,” reps for the the low-cost airline said in a statement.

Those who don’t purchase one ahead of time will be required to buy one at the airport.

This marks a major change from the current policy, in which plus-size passengers can proactively purchase an additional seat with the option of being refunded later, or request a free extra seat at the airport.

Under the new mandate, the second seat is non-refundable unless the flight isn’t fully booked at the time of departure, and if both of the passenger’s tickets are booked in the same fare class. However, the passenger needs to request their money back within 90 days of the flight.

If the flight is fully-booked, the flyer will be rebooked onto a new flight.

Critics were quick to rip Southwest, which has long been seen as a haven for plus-size passengers.

Tigress Osborn, the executive director of the National Association to Advance Fat Acceptance, deemed the overhaul changes “devastating” for plus-size flyers.

“Southwest was the only beacon of hope for many fat people who otherwise wouldn’t have been flying,” she lamented, per the New York Times. “And now that beacon has gone out.”

“I think it’s going to make the flying experience worse for everybody,” seconded Jason Vaughn, an Orlando-based travel agent who shares travel tips for plus-size tourists on his website Fat Travel Tested.

He analogized the makeover to Cracker Barrel’s much-maligned logo makeover.

“They have no idea anymore who their customer is,” the Southwest loyalist lamented. “They have no identity left.”

The seating policy follows a string of controversial changes that the Texas-based airline rolled out as a way to bolster revenue and ward off advances from activist investors.

These included scrapping the popular “first come first serve” seating policy that allowed customers to select their own seats upon boarding.

Starting January 27 — the same day as the plus-size seating policy goes into effect — flyers will be assigned seats in advance.

In May, the airline also bagged the decades-old “bags fly free” policy, whereby passengers were allowed two complimentary checked pieces of luggage regardless of their ticket fare.

Critics claimed that ending these policies was the wrong move as they distinguished the airline from other carriers.

Even the airline’s own executives ripped the complimentary luggage program overhaul, claiming that they could garner up to $1.5 billion from baggage fees, but that they’d lose $1.8 billion in market share from people who flew the airline because of the perk.