Amtrak Posts the Highest Revenue Year in Its History
FINANCE
A U.S. rail system many wrote off as outdated just delivered the strongest year in its history — and it did it without fast trains, modern tracks, or real infrastructure investment. If this is the baseline, the upside is far bigger than anyone expected.
Amtrak has just logged the strongest financial year in its 53-year history, setting records in both ridership and revenue. The railroad, long dismissed as outdated and perpetually underfunded, quietly delivered the highest operating figures it has ever reported — and the numbers reveal a system shifting from recovery to a new phase of growth.
Ridership Hits an All-Time High
Amtrak reports 34.5 million customer trips in Fiscal Year 2025 — the most passengers it has ever carried. That’s a 5.1% increase from FY24 and marks the first time ridership fully surpassed pre-pandemic levels on nearly every corridor.
Much of the surge came from the Northeast Corridor, where travelers frustrated with airline prices and delays turned back to rail. But regional routes in the Midwest, California, and the Southeast also saw meaningful gains.
Record-Breaking Ticket Revenue
Amtrak generated $2.7 billion in adjusted ticket revenue, the highest in its history and up 10.4% year-over-year.
Total operating revenue reached $3.9 billion, a 9.1% gain — another all-time record.
The revenue jump wasn’t just from higher fares. Trains were fuller, more reliable, and in several markets, more frequent. Long-distance service — traditionally a drag on financials — also improved.
Why This Boom Is Even More Surprising
Here’s the part that stands out:
Amtrak is breaking records without the kind of infrastructure its peers around the world rely on.
The U.S. still does not have high-speed rail on any major corridor.
Many trains run on tracks owned and prioritized by freight companies.
Federal investment has been piecemeal for decades, with upgrades happening slowly and inconsistently.
Even with new infrastructure funding approved, only a fraction has been deployed.
In other words:
This record-breaking year didn’t come from having world-class rail — it came from the ground floor of what American rail could be.
The demand Amtrak is seeing today exists despite the limitations, not because they’ve been solved.
Momentum Heading Into a Bigger Fight
The numbers give Amtrak rare political leverage. If rail can post its strongest year in history under these conditions — slow trains, aging tracks, bottlenecked corridors — then the case for expanding corridors and investing in faster, modern rail gets much stronger.
The challenge is whether Congress will treat this success as a launchpad or a ceiling. Amtrak has shown that Americans will use rail when it’s available. But scaling from “record revenue” to “world-class service” still requires billions in upgrades and a willingness to treat rail as a national asset, not an afterthought.
The Bottom Line
Amtrak just delivered the best year it has ever had, but it’s doing so with infrastructure that lags far behind Asia and Europe.
If this is what demand looks like at the ground floor, the potential upside of a truly modern rail system is far greater than the numbers suggest.