Cargo airlines (or air cargo companies, and the derivations of these names) are airlines dedicated to the transportation of cargo. Some cargo airlines are divisions or subsidiaries of large passenger airlines.

Air transportation is a vital component of many international logistics networks, essential for directing and controlling the flow of goods, energy, information and other resources such as products, services, and people, from the point of production to the point of sale. It is difficult or practically impossible to carry out any international transportation, global export/import processes, international replenishment of raw materials/products and their transportation without professional logistics support. This process involves the inclusion of information, transportation, inventory, storage, material management and packaging. The operational responsibility of the logistics system in the geographical replacement of raw materials, work in process and final inventories must always be carried out at the lowest possible cost.

Large cargo airlines tend to use new or recently built aircraft to transport their cargo, but many other airlines use older aircraft, such as the Boeing 707, Boeing 727, Douglas DC-8, DC-10, MD-11, Boeing 747, and Ilyushin Il-76. Some sixty-year-old Douglas DC-3s are still flying around the world carrying cargo (as well as passengers). Short-range turboprop aircraft such as the An-12, An-26, Fokker Friendship, and British Aerospace ATP are currently being modified to accommodate standard air cargo pallets and thus extend their useful life. This normally involves replacing the windows with opaque panels, reinforcing the cabin floor, and placing a large door on one side of the plane.

The Antonov An-225 and the Antonov An-124 are the largest aircraft in the world, used for the transport of large cargo or goods of exceptional dimensions.

The use of large military aircraft for commercial purposes, promoted by the Ukrainian Antonov Airlines in the nineties, has made possible the emergence of new types of cargo in air transport.

Some cargo airlines also carry passengers on their flights from time to time, just as UPS tried unsuccessfully to create a charter airline division.

Domestic regular cargo flow ton-kilometer in 2004

Source of 2004 data: IATA. Only includes data from member airlines.