Southwest is the only major US airline who does not normally charge for a checked bag in economy on domestic flights. Other airlines: Alaska ($25), Allegiant (up to $35), American ($35), Delta ($30), Frontier ($25), Hawaiian ($25), JetBlue ($30), Spirit ($30), United ($30).

Spirit, at least, does the right thing and charges $5 more to carry a typical bag onboard.

Maybe it's because all my flights are international, or domestic connections to international, then.

International flights are the only fights with sane pricing in the US now. What's even better is that you can avoid the slight nickel and diming they've begun to do by exclusively using international carriers.

I remember being blown away by the service I got on Singapore and Malaysia Airlines. Great food, decent amount of leg room, flight attendants that don't have complete and utter contempt for everyone that isn't in Business class or above, and free alcohol. That is until I realized they weren't that special, the North American companies were just significantly worse at pretty much all aspects of the flying experience. Often times the North American companies with their fees aren't even saving you much money, or none at all if you plan well, so its an easy choice when your flight is at least 12 hours. The dream would be to have them compete and operate domestic flights as well. It would be great to go from Chicago to Dulles on ANA instead of United.

Yup! You can't get away with that in the international market.

If you book a short-haul ticket with Lufthansa or British Airways, you'll almost certainly be offered a range of fares including a "hand-baggage only" fare. This comes with zero included checked bags.

Even if you have elite status with BA, you won't get an free checked bag if you book such a fare[1]. LH are temporarily "as a goodwill rule" allowing their elites and star alliance gold elites to get one free checked bag on 'Light' fares[2].

1. https://www.britishairways.com/en-gb/information/baggage-ess...

2. https://www.lufthansa.com/uk/en/economy-light-fare

I've flown literally hundreds of times in my life and with a single exception of a holiday flight with TUI, I have never ever been on a flight where a checked bag was included. Literally never.

I've flown BA several times this year intra-Europe without bag included.