In 2024, Japanese Star Alliance carrier All Nippon Airways (ANA) launched AirJapan, as a new subsidiary. The intent was that the airline would operate Boeing 787-8s in an all-economy layout. ANA insisted that AirJapan wasn’t a full service or low cost airline, but instead, would “combine the best of both worlds while also featuring Japanese-style ideas and quality.”
Well, unfortunately it looks like this won’t be sticking around for much longer, as plans have already been announced for this operation to be discontinued. However, the logic is open to interpretation.
In this post:
AirJapan will stop flying as of late March 2026
ANA has made the decision to restructure its brand strategy, aimed at maximizing the entire group’s profitability and competitiveness, while responding to changes in the business environment. With this, we’re going to see the AirJapan brand cease operations as of March 28, 2026, meaning the two Boeing 787-8s will no longer operate under AirJapan brand.
So as of that date, AirJapan’s flights from Tokyo Narita (NRT) to Bangkok (BKK), Seoul Incheon (ICN), and Singapore (SIN), will no longer operate with AirJapan branding.
Going forward, ANA will move from a multi-brand strategy to a dual-brand strategy. That means that Peach will be the group’s low cost (regional) carrier, while ANA will be the brand for all other flights.
Why is the AirJapan brand being eliminated after only around two years? Well, ANA’s explanation isn’t terribly clear. As the company describes it, “the global environment has seen changes such as the prolonged war in Ukraine and aircraft delivery delays, with concerns that these issues will continue,” and somehow that’s why AirJapan is being eliminated.
It sounds like ANA is worried that delivery delays will drag on with its new aircraft, and that these planes will be more profitable it flown under the ANA brand rather than under a separate brand. But that’s also a bit of a non-explanation.
If the yields with AirJapan were good, it doesn’t really explain why you’d eliminate the subsidiary. So I’m guessing it just wasn’t as lucrative as ANA hoped, and the airline wants to cut its losses sooner rather than later, and focus on its core brand. It remains to be seen with what timeline ANA actually reconfigures these AirJapan planes.
Don’t confuse ANA’s AirJapan with ANA’s Air Japan
This is where things get kind of funny, so let me clarify something. ANA is eliminating its AirJapan branded flights, which are the flights operated by two Boeing 787-8s that are in an all-economy layout.
However, ANA isn’t eliminating Air Japan, which is another subsidiary it has. Essentially, Air Japan is a subsidiary that technically operates a vast majority of ANA’s Boeing 787s, but the branding isn’t used in a customer facing way.
Those planes are painted in the ANA livery, and a vast majority of passengers wouldn’t even realize they’re technically flying on a subsidiary. However, during the booking process, you’ll often see a little note that the flight is operated by Air Japan.
So, why does ANA have the Air Japan subsidiary? I believe it’s due to some labor opportunities that this subsidiary provides, including the ability to hire foreign pilots back in the day (though that’s less of an issue nowadays, since Japan has less of a local pilot shortage).
So at least with the AirJapan branded operation ending, it should help with the confusion that many passengers have experienced, where people saw mention of their flight being operated by Air Japan, and assumed that meant they were flying on the all-economy subsidiary.
Bottom line
All Nippon Airways intends to eliminate its AirJapan brand as of late March 2026, a little over two years after launch. This operation had two Boeing 787-8s in an all-economy layout. ANA blames this decision on the Ukraine war and delayed aircraft deliveries, though I suspect the simple answer is that this just didn’t prove as lucrative as the company hoped, and it makes more sense to focus on the core brand.
What do you make of ANA eliminating AirJapan?
Probably they could make it work if instead of an all economy layout they also had a premium product similar to ZipAir’s flatbed and if had focused on less saturated and highly competitive routes.
We flew Air Japan twice, loved it and had planned to fly it at least twice a year. Gonna miss it and hope they'd reconsider ceasing it. Won't travel on overpriced ANA or terrible Peach.
Air Japan once existed to circumvent Chinese ban on airlines serving Taiwan - while ANA flies to mainland China, Air Japan served Taiwan - like British Asia Airways or Air France Asie.
Air Japan failed to attract customers as their avg load factor sticks around 65% in 1H 2025 - much lower than ANA and pretty low for Low Cost Carrier, IMO.
Hmm, not 100% sure about the Air Japan thing - all of the flights operating as Air Japan up until March 26 seem to be showing as operated by ANA after March 27? Or did Google Flights get confused? (e.g. HND-HKG)
Other than the flights sold as NQ xxx, all the flights are flown under ANA brand and seat/inflight service etc are based on ANA standard. Pretty confusing.
Could not compete with ZipAir which is awesome.
Fly them within Asia frequently. The flights are mostly full and people are happy with them and free quickish WiFi which is unheard of in Asia.
Ambitious roll out of ZipAir by Japan Airlines that has been successful.
Funny that there’s not a mention of ZIPAIR Tokyo in the article, JAL’s equivalent of AirJapan, and supposedly the one it was supposed to compete with. In fact, ZG has been quite successful flying its ‘basic lie-flat business class’ to places like Singapore and North America, so I wonder how ANA couldn’t replicate what JAL did so well with ZG.
Just like you said, it seems like the key point of ZIPAIR'S success was these no frills lie-flat seats. Compare that to the AirJapan B788s with all-economy layout. I've seen their initial plan for AirJapan where ANAHD planned a two-class layout for the brand, but that shifted away for some reason.
Who wouldn't want "Japanese-style ideas and quality"... (side note, which 'ideas' exactly? Hopefully, more like Mitsubishi *cars*... not A6Ms.)
AirJapan was not a separate company, but rather a brand that Air Japan Co., Ltd. operated. Basically, Air Japan crew operated on both the AirJapan and the mainline ANA flights on occassion.
Air Japan owns and operates all of ANA 787s for international flights (domestic 787s are directly operated by ANA) and seems like it will continue so. ANA has also decided to transfer all their B738s to ANA Wings some time ago.
Even more confusingly, their 3rd 788 just went into cabin fit at the beginning of October....
Was AirJapan trying to be like JALWays from yesteryear? I feel like ANAs A380s are being used just like JALWays were with their 747s.
Binter Canarias plays this weird game as well. Your flight could be operated by Binter, Canarias Airlines or NAYSA but all aircraft are in Binter livery.