Alaska Airlines expands long-haul Boeing 737 MAX operations with up-to-nine-hour flights

The return flight from Liberia to Seattle varies significantly in duration. While it can be as short as seven hours and forty-eight minutes, some schedules list it at over nine hours during certain periods in spring 2025. The service operates weekly using the Boeing 737 MAX 8.

Alaska Airlines CEO Ben Minicucci leads the company as it adds new long-distance routes. The airline does not offer seatback entertainment screens on these flights but allows passengers to stream content on their own devices.

Another notable addition is a new route between Seattle and Keflavik (Iceland), set to begin in May 2026. This service will cover over 3,100 nautical miles each way, making it Alaska’s longest-ever route operated by a Boeing 737 and the longest scheduled MAX flight by any U.S. airline. The daily service will use a configuration with twelve domestic first-class seats and one hundred forty-seven economy seats. Alaska Airlines will codeshare with Icelandair on this route.

Flights between New York JFK and Anchorage (launched June 2024), Liberia to San Francisco (starting December 2024), Miami to Seattle, Belize City to Seattle, Fort Lauderdale to Seattle, New York JFK to San Francisco, Boston to San Francisco, Miami to Portland, and Cancun to Seattle are also among those exceeding six hours and fifty minutes in block time.

Between January and May 2025, data from the U.S. Department of Transportation indicated that Alaska filled ninety percent of available seats on its Liberia-Seattle flights—a factor contributing to the extension of this seasonal service into a second year.

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