Qantas, Jetstar to launch Western Sydney Airport flights

Qantas and Jetstar will connect the new $6 billion Western Sydney International Airport (WSI) to Melbourne, Brisbane and the Gold Coast, with first flights from Sunday October 25 – although it will be low-cost carrier Jetstar which takes the lead.

Jetstar will start with a double-daily service to Melbourne, four weekly flights to the Gold Coast and three to Brisbane on its workhorse A320 aircraft.

Qantas – or rather, QantasLink – won’t appear on the WSI departures board until March 28, 2027, with four services a week to both Melbourne and Brisbane on nimble Embraer E190 regional jets rather than the larger Boeing 737s which dominate its Sydney Airport flights.

It’s possible that the modern mid-sized Airbus A220 could follow, with Qantas Group CEO Vanessa Hudson previously describing the A220 as “a perfect aircraft for Western Sydney.”

Qantas will launch WSI flights with its regional E190 jet.

The QantasLink E190s have between 94 and 97 seats, with up to ten seats in business class.

The Airbus A220 lifts that to 137 seats (10 in business and 127 in economy) – still around 25% fewer seats than the Sydney-based Boeing 737s.

All Jetstar and Qantas flights will go on sale at 10am on Wednesday June 10, with launch fares from $59 on Jetstar, $99 in Qantas economy and $299 for business class.

“We’re incredibly proud that Jetstar will be the first Australian airline to begin operations at Western Sydney International Airport and Qantas will follow early next year,” said Qantas Group CEO Vanessa Hudson, calling the new flights a “major milestone for Australian aviation”.

“Jetstar has an incredible history of growing new markets, and being the first airline to launch will give one of the country’s fastest growing regions better access to low fares.”

Qantas and Jetstar will both fly to Western Sydney International Airport.

Hudson said the Qantas and Jetstar flights would  “make aviation more accessible for millions of people in Western Sydney who currently have to travel to Kingsford Smith to catch a flight.”

Qantas’ plans for a lounge at WSI have yet to be shared, although the most likely prospect would be a Qantas Club to welcome all loungeworthy travellers ahead of their Qantas or Jetstar flight, or access to an independent third-party lounge

You'd have to think that a Qantas Club lounge is also on the cards for WSI...

The announcement of Qantas and Jetstar flights from WSI will certainly be welcomed by the three million people who live within one hour’s travel of the airport.

“This makes us the third largest catchment area in Australia,” WSI chief executive Simon Hickey has previously told Executive Traveller.

“You’ve got Sydney, then Melbourne, and then Western Sydney,” which he also cites as “the third largest economy in Australia... and one of the fastest-growing populations in Australia, a younger population with lots of businesses, a really ambitious population who are great travellers.”

Residents of western Sydney could recover as much as two hours on a same-day trip to Melbourne or Brisbane, which means getting home in time for dinner with the family and to tuck the kids into bed.

The new WSI metro line won't open until 2028.

However, travellers will be forced to rely on cars or buses until the delayed Western Sydney Airport metro train line opens sometime in 2028.

Air New Zealand will launch the airport’s first international flights to Auckland on October 26, with Singapore Airlines taking off from November 23, while the path has been cleared for daily Emirates and Qatar Airways flights from the curfew-free airport to their respective hubs at Dubai and Doha.

Virgin Australia has yet to announce its plans for flights from WSI.

Also read: Emirates, Qatar cleared for Western Sydney airport takeoff