Philippine Airlines Restores Manila Chicago Nonstop After 38 Years

Philippine Airlines is back in Chicago after 38 years. The flag carrier inaugurated its nonstop service between Manila's Ninoy Aquino International Airport and Chicago O'Hare on Monday, November 9, 2026, with a send-off ceremony at Terminal 5. It's the first scheduled nonstop passenger service ever flown between the two cities.

Flight PR132 leaves Manila at 4:40 p.m. and lands in Chicago at 4:55 p.m. the same day, a block time of 14 hours and 15 minutes. The return, PR133, leaves O'Hare at 10:45 p.m. and reaches Manila at 5:25 a.m. two calendar days later, after 16 hours and 40 minutes in the air. At 8,132 miles, the route is the longest nonstop out of O'Hare and the airline's third-longest anywhere.

The flights run three times a week, on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, on a 295-seat Airbus A350-900 with business, premium economy and economy cabins. Chicago becomes Philippine Airlines' eighth destination in the United States and its territories, and the schedule is filed as year-round, with a peak of 14 departures a month in March 2027.

Mayor Brandon Johnson joined the launch alongside PAL Holdings President and Chief Operating Officer Lucio C. Tan III and Chicago Department of Aviation Commissioner Michael McMurray. Consul General Melanie Rita B. Diano called the return a development that runs past convenience, pointing to trade, tourism and the Philippines' engagement with the U.S. Midwest. The launch also lands in 2026, the year the Philippines and the United States mark 80 years of diplomatic relations.

The airline first announced the route in April 2026 and sold launch fares while it waited for November. The send-off at Terminal 5 was staged as a homecoming as much as an inauguration, with a ribbon cutting, a ceremonial cake and members of the Santacruzan Cultural Group of Greater Chicago in attendance. The same-day arrival on PR132 is a date-line quirk of the westbound Pacific crossing: the flight lands 14 hours and 15 minutes after it leaves, and the clock in Chicago has barely moved.

The airline last served Chicago between November 1985 and April 1988. Since then, Midwest travelers bound for Manila have connected through the West Coast or Asia, adding a stop and hours to the trip. The consulate puts the audience at an estimated 450,000 Filipinos and Filipino Americans across the Midwest, and through Manila the flight connects onward to destinations across Southeast Asia and the wider Asia-Pacific region.