Thanksgiving 2026 is Thursday, November 26, and the busiest day at airport security will almost certainly be Sunday, November 29. On the matching Sunday in 2025, TSA screened 3,134,613 people, the most in its history.
Everything below comes from TSA’s own numbers: its daily national checkpoint counts for 2024, 2025 and 2026, and its hourly throughput report for every airport and checkpoint, published in the TSA FOIA reading room. Those counts measure how many people went through security, not how long they waited. Crowds and lines are not the same thing, since airports open extra lanes for the rush they expect, but the busiest days and hours are where the long lines come from.
Thanksgiving 2026 at a Glance
- Busiest day: Sunday, November 29. The matching day in 2025 drew 3,134,613 people.
- Second busiest: Monday, November 30 (2,893,451 in 2025), not the Wednesday before.
- Lightest day: Thanksgiving Day, Thursday, November 26, with about half the Sunday crowd (1,559,165).
- Busiest hour: the 5 a.m. hour. Nationally it was the busiest hour of every single day of Thanksgiving week 2025.
- Biggest jump at a major airport: Denver, which screened 64% more people on the Sunday after Thanksgiving than on a normal early-December weekday.
Day by Day: Thanksgiving Week 2026
TSA publishes how many people it screens every day. Each 2026 date below is matched to the same weekday in the same spot relative to Thanksgiving in 2025 and 2024:
| 2026 | 2025 | 2024 | What to expect |
|---|---|---|---|
| Fri, Nov 20 | 2,792,495 | 2,754,798 | Very busy |
| Sat, Nov 21 | 2,482,593 | 2,493,313 | Moderate |
| Sun, Nov 22 | 2,617,142 | 2,659,301 | Busy |
| Mon, Nov 23 | 2,563,877 | 2,506,373 | Moderate |
| Tue, Nov 24 | 2,675,261 | 2,694,504 | Busy |
| Wed, Nov 25 | 2,753,036 | 2,726,845 | Very busy |
| Thu, Nov 26 (Thanksgiving) | 1,559,165 | 1,551,896 | Lightest day of the week |
| Fri, Nov 27 | 2,392,036 | 2,377,911 | Moderate |
| Sat, Nov 28 | 2,696,816 | 2,811,101 | Busy |
| Sun, Nov 29 | 3,134,613 | 3,088,836 | Peak, the busiest day of the year |
| Mon, Nov 30 | 2,893,451 | 2,829,000 | Very busy |
| Tue, Dec 1 | 2,233,828 | 2,283,750 | Back to normal |
The “what to expect” labels are our reading of those counts. For scale, TSA averaged 2,484,208 people a day across all of 2025.
What the table says:
- The Sunday after Thanksgiving is in a league of its own. In 2025 it beat the Wednesday before by about 380,000 travelers, and in 2024 it was the record at the time.
- The Monday after is the day people forget. It was the second-busiest day of the holiday stretch in both years.
- The Wednesday before has a bigger reputation than its numbers. In this table it ranks fourth in 2025 and fifth in 2024, behind even the Friday a week before Thanksgiving.
- That Friday a week before (November 20 this year) is a sleeper. It drew 2.79 million in 2025 and 2.75 million in 2024. Fridays run high all year, and this one stacks early holiday trips on top.
- Thanksgiving Day is the calm in the middle. If a short morning flight still gets you to dinner, it is the easiest day of the week to fly.
Flying again in December? See the Christmas and New Year travel TSA guide, where a Friday Christmas shifts the peak days.
Will Thanksgiving 2026 Break the Record?
It isn’t a given. Over the last eight weeks of TSA’s daily counts (August 28 to October 22, 2026), checkpoint volume ran about 2% below the same weeks of 2025, and TSA has not yet screened 3 million people on any day of 2026 (the high so far is 2,988,204 on June 18). If that gap holds, Sunday, November 29 would land a little under last year’s 3.13 million, and it would still be the busiest day of the week by a wide margin.
As of October 25, 2026, TSA has not published a Thanksgiving 2026 projection. Last year’s came out on November 21, 2025, five days before the holiday: TSA expected to screen more than 17.8 million people from Tuesday, November 25 to Tuesday, December 2, with over 3 million on the Sunday after. Its daily counts for those eight days came to 20,338,206, and the Sunday reached 3,134,613. If TSA keeps the same timing, expect the 2026 forecast in the week before Thanksgiving.
The Busiest Hours at Security
TSA’s hourly report shows when the crowd actually walks through the checkpoint. Nationally, for Thanksgiving week 2025:
- The 5 a.m. hour was the busiest hour of every day, from the Sunday before Thanksgiving through the following week. On the Sunday after, more than 210,000 people went through checkpoints between 5:00 and 5:59 a.m. local time.
- The early wave is bigger on Thanksgiving Day. About 45% of that day’s screenings happened before 8 a.m., as people flew early to make dinner.
- The Sunday after has an evening tail. 21% of its screenings came after 5 p.m., compared with 16% on a normal early-December weekday.
Share of each day’s screenings by time of day (TSA hourly throughput, local airport time):
| Time of day | Wed before | Thanksgiving Day | Sunday after | Normal weekday |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Before 8 a.m. | 30% | 45% | 26% | 29% |
| 8 a.m. to noon | 24% | 29% | 23% | 25% |
| Noon to 5 p.m. | 29% | 17% | 29% | 30% |
| 5 to 8 p.m. | 13% | 6% | 15% | 11% |
| After 8 p.m. | 5% | 4% | 6% | 4% |
“Normal weekday” is the average of Tuesday to Thursday, December 2 to 4, 2025. Because the early block is only about four busy hours long, it is the most crowded stretch of the day per hour. If your flight leaves between 6 and 9 a.m. on a peak day, you are in the biggest wave of the day, so plan your arrival for the early edge of your window.
For how checkpoint traffic moves the rest of the year, see the busiest days and times at airport security.
Airport by Airport: Last Thanksgiving’s Peaks
The same TSA report breaks the counts down by airport. For 20 of the busiest airports, here is each one’s busiest day of Thanksgiving week 2025, about how many people went through security that day, how that compares with a normal early-December weekday, and the three busiest hours that day (local time, rounded to the nearest 100). Each code links to that airport’s page, which has the full day-by-day and hour-by-hour charts.
| Airport | Busiest day (2025) | People screened | vs. normal weekday | Busiest hours that day |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ATL | Sun, Nov 30 | 105,600 | +38% | 6, 7 and 8 a.m. |
| LAX | Sun, Nov 30 | 115,700 | +37% | 7, 8 and 9 a.m. |
| ORD | Sun, Nov 30 | 109,800 | +30% | 8 a.m., 1 and 4 p.m. |
| JFK | Sun, Nov 30 | 102,500 | +16% | 7 a.m., 4 and 6 p.m. |
| MCO | Sun, Nov 30 | 95,700 | +45% | 5, 6 and 7 a.m. |
| DFW | Sun, Nov 30 | 87,800 | +26% | 6, 8 and 9 a.m. |
| DEN | Sun, Nov 30 | 86,000 | +64% | 7, 10 and 11 a.m. |
| SFO | Sun, Nov 30 | 83,100 | +34% | 6 a.m., 7 a.m. and noon |
| EWR | Sun, Nov 30 | 82,400 | +22% | 5 a.m., 7 a.m. and 4 p.m. |
| LAS | Sun, Nov 23 | 93,800 | +76% | 5 a.m., 10 a.m. and noon |
| MIA | Sun, Nov 30 | 87,900 | +36% | 4, 5 and 6 p.m. |
| PHX | Sun, Nov 30 | 76,400 | +37% | 6, 7 and 8 a.m. |
| SEA | Sun, Nov 30 | 67,700 | +37% | 7, 8 and 9 a.m. |
| BOS | Sun, Nov 30 | 72,300 | +29% | 6 a.m., 5 and 6 p.m. |
| IAH | Sun, Nov 30 | 66,900 | +33% | 6 a.m., 4 and 5 p.m. |
| LGA | Sun, Nov 30 | 60,500 | +28% | Noon, 1 and 2 p.m. |
| FLL | Sun, Nov 30 | 61,100 | +53% | 6, 9 and 10 a.m. |
| MSP | Sun, Nov 30 | 49,900 | +45% | 5 a.m., 6 a.m. and noon |
| TPA | Sun, Nov 30 | 46,000 | +52% | 5 a.m., 9 a.m. and 6 p.m. |
| RSW | Sun, Nov 30 | 24,400 | +43% | 5, 9 and 10 a.m. |
“Normal weekday” is each airport’s average for Tuesday to Thursday, December 2 to 4, 2025. The matching days in 2026 are one date earlier: Sunday, November 29 for most airports, and Sunday, November 22 for Las Vegas.
What stands out:
- Most airports peak in the morning, even on the Sunday after. ATL, LAX, MCO, PHX, SEA and MSP were all busiest between 5 and 9 a.m.
- Miami peaks in the evening. Its three busiest hours on the Sunday after Thanksgiving were 4, 5 and 6 p.m. If you are flying out of MIA that afternoon, the morning-is-worst rule does not apply.
- LaGuardia peaks at midday. Noon to 3 p.m. was its busiest stretch on the Sunday after, and 1 p.m. was its busiest hour on the Wednesday before too.
- O’Hare is busy all day. On the Sunday after, its 8 a.m., 1 p.m. and 4 p.m. hours were within about 1% of each other, so there is no quiet window to aim for.
- JFK, Boston and Houston Bush have a second, late-afternoon peak on the Sunday after, alongside the morning one.
- Boston starts early. On the Wednesday before Thanksgiving, Logan’s busiest hour was 4 a.m., with about 5,900 people screened.
- Las Vegas is the exception. Its busiest day was the Sunday before Thanksgiving (November 23, 2025), 76% above a normal weekday. The Sunday after was its second busiest.
- Apart from Las Vegas, the biggest jumps were Denver (+64%), Fort Lauderdale (+53%) and Tampa (+52%). At those airports, a normal-weekday arrival plan falls furthest short.
Your airport isn’t in the table? Airport TSA Times has the same Thanksgiving charts for all 73 airports it tracks.
What’s Different This Year
Every adult needs ID that works, or $45
Thanksgiving 2026 is the first Thanksgiving under TSA’s $45 ConfirmID fee. Since February 1, 2026, any adult who reaches the checkpoint without acceptable ID (a REAL ID with the star, a passport, or another ID on TSA’s list) pays $45 on Pay.gov for identity verification, and paying doesn’t guarantee you get through. A license without the star counts as no ID. IDs on TSA’s list are still accepted up to two years past expiration. If someone in your group is short, read flying without an ID before you leave, and see the new TSA rules for 2026 for the other changes.
Funding runs past Thanksgiving
TSA is funded through December 11, 2026 under the current continuing resolution, so Thanksgiving week falls inside it. The deadline matters more for Christmas; see what a government shutdown does to TSA lines.
Shoes stay on, power banks have new limits
Shoes have stayed on in standard lanes since July 2025 (the details). Flying internationally, you can carry at most two power banks and can’t recharge them on board under the 2026 ICAO rule (electronics rules).
How Early to Get to the Airport for Thanksgiving
The usual “2 hours for domestic” isn’t enough on the peak days. Our rule of thumb for Thanksgiving week:
- Domestic flight on a peak day (Wednesday before, Sunday or Monday after): arrive 3 hours before departure.
- Domestic flight on a lighter day: arrive 2.5 hours before.
- International flight: arrive 3.5 hours before.
Pad more if your flight leaves in the early-morning wave or from an airport with a big jump in the table above. Parking, rental car returns and bag drop all back up on the same days. For the full framework, see what time you should arrive at the airport.
Packing Tips to Move Faster
Thanksgiving travelers slow the line for predictable reasons, mostly food and gifts.
Bringing Thanksgiving food?
The rule of thumb: solid foods are fine in a carry-on, and “liquid or gel” foods follow the 3-1-1 rule.
- Carry-on OK: pies, cakes, cookies, turkey, stuffing, solid casseroles, bread rolls and most baked goods
- Treated as liquids (3.4 oz limit in a carry-on): gravy, cranberry sauce, jams, jellies, mashed potatoes, wine, canned goods and soups
- Pack full-size gravy and cranberry sauce in your checked bag. This is the most common Thanksgiving checkpoint mistake.
For the complete breakdown, see can you bring food through TSA and the 3-1-1 liquids rule.
Bringing gifts?
Don’t wrap gifts before flying. TSA may need to unwrap a package to inspect it. Use gift bags, wrap after you arrive, or ship bulky presents ahead.
General fast-lane packing
- Skip the belt and heavy jewelry. Shoes now stay on in standard lanes; see what to wear through airport security.
- Keep your liquids bag and electronics at the top of your bag.
- Empty your pockets before you reach the conveyor.
- Review the full 12 tips to get through security faster.
Is It Too Late to Get TSA PreCheck for Thanksgiving?
Maybe not, but don’t count on it. PreCheck lanes are separate from the standard line, and you keep your belt and light jacket on and your laptop and liquids packed. Approval times vary, so apply now if you want it for the holidays and plan for the standard line in case your Known Traveler Number isn’t ready. See how to apply for TSA PreCheck and whether PreCheck or Global Entry is the better fit.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the busiest travel day of Thanksgiving 2026?
The Sunday after Thanksgiving, November 29, 2026. The matching Sunday in 2025 was the busiest day in TSA history at 3,134,613 travelers. The Monday after (November 30) was second in both 2024 and 2025, ahead of the Wednesday before Thanksgiving.
Is the Wednesday before Thanksgiving the busiest day to fly?
No. It is busy, but in TSA’s counts it trailed the Sunday after, the Monday after and even the Friday a week before Thanksgiving in both 2024 and 2025. In 2025 the Wednesday before drew 2,753,036 people, about 380,000 fewer than the Sunday after.
What is the best day to fly for Thanksgiving?
Thanksgiving Day itself (Thursday, November 26). TSA screened 1,559,165 people on the matching day in 2025, about half the Sunday crowd. Flying out Monday, November 23 or earlier and coming home Tuesday, December 1 or later also avoids the biggest crowds.
What time is TSA busiest during Thanksgiving week?
The 5 a.m. hour. In TSA’s hourly counts for Thanksgiving week 2025, it was the busiest hour nationally on every day of the week, and about 30% of screenings on the Wednesday before happened before 8 a.m. A few airports differ: Miami peaked at 4 to 6 p.m. and LaGuardia at midday on the Sunday after.
How early should I get to the airport for Thanksgiving?
Three hours before a domestic flight on the peak days (the Wednesday before and the Sunday and Monday after), 2.5 hours on lighter days, and 3.5 hours for international flights. Add more for early-morning departures and for airports that get much busier over the holiday, such as Denver, Fort Lauderdale and Tampa.
Will Thanksgiving 2026 set a new TSA record?
Possibly, but it is not a given. TSA hasn’t published a 2026 projection yet, its 2026 counts have been running about 2% below 2025, and no day in 2026 has reached 3 million so far. The record to beat is 3,134,613 on November 30, 2025.
Can I bring Thanksgiving food through TSA?
Yes. Solid foods like pies, cakes, turkey and casseroles are fine in a carry-on. Gravy, cranberry sauce, jams and other spreadable or pourable foods follow the 3-1-1 liquids rule (3.4 oz in a carry-on), so pack full-size versions in a checked bag.
Should I wrap gifts before flying for Thanksgiving?
No. TSA may unwrap a gift to inspect it. Use gift bags or wrap presents after you arrive.
Check your airport before you go. Every airport page on Airport TSA Times shows that airport’s Thanksgiving week from last year, day by day and hour by hour, from TSA’s own counts. Look up your airport and plan your arrival around its busiest hours.