Southwest Airlines Partners AWS To Transition To Cloud-based, AI-enabled Architecture By 2028

(RTTNews) - Southwest Airlines Co. (LUV) announced Wednesday a partnership with Amazon Web Services (AWS) as its preferred cloud provider to modernize its technology foundation and evolve how the airline operates, builds, and is able to serve its customers. This is expected to help Southwest move faster and automate tasks in minutes that used to take hours.

As part of the partnership, Southwest will transition from a largely on-premises environment to a fully cloud-based, AI- and agent-enabled architecture on AWS by 2028. This will lay the foundation to operate with greater speed, flexibility, and reliability to support the business.

Southwest will expand how it uses AI and agent-based capabilities across the business by adopting new tools like Amazon Quick. Southwest is also using Kiro, AWS's agentic coding service, to modernize one of its largest and most critical Customer-facing platforms—Southwest.com.

Using an intelligent software development workflow built on AWS capabilities like AI-Driven Development Lifecycle (AIDLC), Southwest is adopting a more agent-driven way of working. In this model, AI agents help move development forward, while engineering teams remain responsible for guiding, validating, and owning the outcomes.

As the airline continues to evolve its business model and Customer experience, it is also accelerating efforts to simplify its technology environment and improve how systems work together at scale.