American Eagle has 580 regional aircraft operated by 6 different airlines. The American Airlines Group (AAG) wholly owns three of these carriers: Envoy Air, PSA Airlines, and Piedmont Airlines. The other three operating for Eagle are SkyWest Airlines, Air Wisconsin, and Republic Airlines. Previous airlines that flew under the American Eagle brand since the merger (2013-) were Mesa, ExpressJet, Compass Airlines, and TransStates Airlines. American also had Chautauqua Airlines operating as AmericanConnection but merged the brand with American Eagle in 2014.
American and its pilots have a scope clause agreement that limits the number of regional jets operated under the American Eagle brand to 75% of the total number of narrowbodies operated by mainline AA. In addition, "large" regional jets seating over 65 passengers are limited to 40% of the number of narrowbodies.
Air Wisconsin
On August 22, 2022 American announced Air Wisconsin will be operating under the American Eagle brand beginning in March 2023 with up to 60 CRJ-200 aircraft in a 5 year contract. The agreement also allows Air Wisconsin to operate the larger CRJ700 in the future. Currently Air Wisconsin operates out of the ORD hub.
Envoy Air
On April 15, 2014 American Eagle Airlines rebranded into Envoy Air. This name change was created to avoid confusion from other regional carriers operating on behalf of American Eagle. The term 'Envoy' came from US Airways' Business Class product 'Envoy Suites'. Envoy is American's largest regional operator with an all Embraer fleet. In 2021 the airline retired the ERJ140 and added 6 E170s to the fleet in a 65 seat configuration to stay within the scope clause limitations. In August 2022 Envoy announced its acquiring 15 more E170s for a total of 27 E170s. The airline also transferred 15 E145s to Piedmont bringing its fleet count to 18 145s and 103 E175s. Envoy retired all their E145s on May 31, 2023 and exclusively flies the E170 family of jets.
Piedmont Airlines
Piedmont started as Henson Airlines in 1961. In 1983, the original Piedmont Airlines (1948 to 1989) bought Henson to operate regional flights. The USAir Group acquired Piedmont and its subsidiaries in 1987 and Henson began flying as USAir Express. The Piedmont name was resurrected in 1993, when USAir renamed Henson to "Piedmont Airlines", to protect the Piedmont brand name and trademark. Piedmont flew Dash 8s for US Airways Express until the merger with American. In 2016 Envoy began transferring over 50 Embraer ERJ-145s to Piedmont as the airline retired the Dash 8. In 2018 the last Dash 8 retired and American Eagle became an all jet fleet once again. In August 2022 Envoy announced its transferring 15 more E145s to Piedmont bringing its fleet count to 61 145s
PSA Airlines
Similar to Piedmont, PSA Airlines began as Vee Neal Airlines and was established in 1979. In December 1983, the airline was renamed Jetstream International Airlines after it took delivery of its first two Jetstream aircraft. August 1, 1986 Piedmont Airlines (1948 to 1989) purchased Jetstream and the airline began a new life as Piedmont Commuter. A year later, Piedmont was purchased by USAir and started to operate under the USAir Express brand. In 1995 USAir announced that it would rename Jetstream International Airlines into PSA Airlines. The name change allowed USAir to protect the brand name of Pacific Southwest Airlines which USAir had purchased at about the same time that it purchased Piedmont.
PSA Airlines now flies under the American Eagle brand. It has a fleet of all CRJ aircraft, 47 of which were transferred from Envoy. In 2018 American ordered 15 CRJ-900 for PSA Airlines to add to its fleet 54 CRJ-900 making a total of 69 by 2020. The airline also operates 61 smaller CRJ-700s. In 2022 PSA began adding more seats to its CRJ-900s. The new configuration will have 79 seats instead of 76.
Republic Airways
In 2013, American signed an agreement with Republic Airways to operate 47 E175s through 2027. In 2016 American agreed to finance bankrupt Republic to reconfigure the existing E175s from 80 seats to 76 to streamline its operation after the merger with US Airways, which also had a large contract with Republic. In 2021 AA and Republic announced the airline will operate 16 E170s in a 65 seat configuration.
SkyWest Airlines
By the end of 2021 SkyWest flew 90 CRJ-700s for American Airlines. SkyWest is adding an additional 11 CRJ-700s to the American Eagle brand bringing the total to 101 by 2023. Separately SkyWest also made a contract with American Airlines for 20 E175s to operate out of the LAX hub.
