Wizz Air will begin its first A321XLR route on March 31, 2025, CEO Jozsef Varadi said at a press conference on September 10, 2024. Not to be confused with its previously announced XLR-operated Milan to Abu Dhabi route from June 2025, the route will be a daily service between Gatwick Airport and Jeddah.
The route will be an overnight flight at just over seven hours, costing passengers £134.99 from Gatwick Airport. British Airways launched its non-stop route to the Saudi Arabian city with operations beginning November this year. From Heathrow to Jeddah on March 31, 2024, British Airways’ fare for economy is currently charging £568, according to its website.
Wizz Air had previously expressed interest in launching routes to India, an emerging market for aviation. Varadi clarified to press at the event that they were still looking into establishing routes. “We are working on it,” said Varadi, speaking to press. “We think there will be results coming out, with India being India, I cannot predict the time when this is going to happen. But we are on it.”
The ultra-low cost carrier will be taking a more strategic approach to launching routes on the XLR, taking its time to launch them. Varadi said the airline will not be launching any transatlantic flights on the XLR. The aircraft adds approximately two hours to its flight time – averaging around eight hours.
US low cost airline Frontier Airlines recently cancelled its XLR order, expressing some disappointment around the aircraft not quite meeting the range they expected. Varadi said the company had spoken with Frontier about the issue. “We consider them as a kind of sister airline,” he commented.
He further added: “I don’t think range maximisation was ever our objective. Our objective was the extension of our footprint… we were drawing a lot of maps to understand what we can reach with the XLR. Actually, we feel quite comfortable with the range extension.”
He said that Frontier has “different issues” with the XLR, having looked at the aircraft to service routes over the Atlantic to Europe.
“There is another issue related to the range matter,” said Varadi. “Should you be flying the XLR beyond eight hours, basically you would be losing rotation of the aircraft… That is diminishing revenue opportunities, diminishing engagement with the consumer.”
The XLR servicing the route is expected to be delivered sometime in February and will be the UK’s first time to receive the aircraft. Varadi did not disclose the value of the aircraft, but said “there is a slight premium over the A321neo”.
“We got the moment right and we got the pricing right,” said Varadi. “As a result, nowadays Airbus can price this airplane in the way they want because of scarcity of supply and availability.”
Currently, around 20% of Wizz Air’s fleet are grounded as a result of the ongoing GTF engine impact. Varadi estimated that in about 18 to 24 months from now, the airline will be “out of this”. He added: “We have been protecting capacity through different actions, by extending existing aircraft operations or taking short term wet leases to make sure we are not giving up the markets.”
When asked by Airline Economics on expected deliveries for the remainder of the year, Varadi said: “We are shooting at moving targets here. We are the mercy of Airbus and what they can deliver. That number keeps changing all the time.
“Maybe the best way to put this is that we are expecting for summer 2025 to be operating roughly 15% larger fleet than what we have today. Some of it will be new deliveries, some of it will be old aircraft return, and some of it is potential engine regains and reintroductions."
The airline is targeting 500 aircraft in its fleet by 2030. However, at the event, he said this could slip back a year or two as a result of delays from Airbus.
“If you look at the fleet on face value, the fleet continues to grow around 30 to 35 aircraft in the next year, but there is a lot of internal dynamics going on.”
It expects capacity to grow 15-20% in the new financial year in 2025, compared to the year prior.