Airport abbreviation origins

Posted on by John

It doesn’t take much imagination to understand why DEN is the IATA abbreviation for the Denver airport, but the abbreviation MCO for the Orlando airport is more of a head scratcher.

Here is a list of the busiest airports in the US along with a brief indication of the reason behind their abbreviations. Some require more explanation, given below.

  1. ATL Hartsfield–Jackson ATLanta International Airport
  2. LAX Los Angeles International Airport (*)
  3. ORD Chicago O’Hare International Airport, formerly ORchardD Field Airport
  4. DFW Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport
  5. DEN DENver International Airport
  6. JFK John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York
  7. SFO San FranciscO International Airport
  8. SEA SEAttle-Tacoma International Airport
  9. MCO Orlando International Airport, formerly McCOy Air Force Base
  10. LAS Harry Reid International Airport in LAS Vegas
  11. CLT CharLoTte-Douglas International Airport
  12. EWR NEWaRk Liberty International Airport (*)
  13. PHX PHoeniX Sky Harbor International Airport
  14. IAH George Bush Intercontinental Airport in Houston (*)
  15. MIA MIAmi International Airport
  16. BOS BOSton Logan International Airport
  17. MSP Minneapolis-Saint Paul International Airport
  18. DTW DeTroit Metropolitan Wayne County Airport
  19. FLL Fort Lauderdale-HoLLywood International Airport
  20. PHL PHiLadelphia International Airport
  21. LGA New York LaGuardia Airport
  22. BWI Baltimore/Washington International Airport
  23. SLC Salt Lake City International Airport
  24. SAN SAN Diego International Airport
  25. IAD Washington Dulles International Airport, named after John Foster Dulles (*)
  26. DCA Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport in Washington DC
  27. TPA TamPA International Airport
  28. MDW Chicago MiDWay International Airport

The Los Angeles airport was originally abbreviated LA. When airports switched to 3-letter abbreviations in 1930, an X was added simply to pad LA to three letters.

In the United States, the initial letter N is reserved for the Navy, and so Newark airport is EWR rather than NEW. The initial letters W and K are also reserved to avoid confusion with radio stations, and initial Q is reserved to avoid confusion with Q codes.

Dulles was originally DIA, but was changed to IAD to avoid confusion with DCA.

Houston’s largest airport, IAH, has an awkward name because the name HOU was already assigned to the older Hobby Airport.

Related posts

Photo by Ronny Siegel from Pexels

3 thoughts on “Airport abbreviation origins”

  1. Nathan

    > In the United States, the initial letter N is reserved for the Navy, and so Newark airport is EWR rather than NEW. The initial letters W and K are also reserved to avoid confusion with radio stations

    This should probably read “in the continental United States”, as most Alaskan airports start with either an N or a K in their code.

  2. John

    Thanks, I didn’t know that.

    My understanding is that there are exceptions for small airports, and I imagine most airports in Alaska are small.

Comments are closed.