The 35-year-old actress had been due to replace original casting Reese Witherspoon on the film, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
The Weinstein Company project starring Keanu Reeves has also shelved its planned April 3 release date in 2015.
'Passengers' is billed as a love story between two passengers aboard a spacecraft that transports people to a colony on a faraway planet.
One passenger (Reeves) is awakened 90 years before anyone else, due to a malfunction in his sleep chambers. Fearing that he could die alone, he decides to wake up another passenger, which McAdams was set to play.