I’ve written in the past about fifth freedom routes. For those of you not familiar with fifth freedom routes, these are flightswhere an airline from one country has the right to operate between two other countries.
Continue reading: 5 Coolest Fifth Freedom Routes In Europe
Share your questions, experiences, and thoughts below.
Fifth freedom requires onward flight to home country. Else it would be 7th freedom.
Not to forget (PEK)-VIE-BCN-VIE-(PEK) with Air China as well as FRA-GVA with Kuwait Airways. Unfortunately Kuwait Airways is flying that route with a A330 now, some months ago they were using their 744 for that route.
Those would actually be 8th freedom flights given that they are from and to Schengen states. ATH-MAN does remain 5th freedom, though, because the UK is not a Schengen state.
@B Owen
Garuda ditched LHR-AMS in favor of a direct between London and Jakarta iirc
This is actually quite interesting in that there are so many freedoms. Looks like Lucky has some learning to do rather than use the Fifth Freedom shorthand.
I'm not sure anyone needs a flat bed on a 1.5-2 hour long flight. But certainly added comfort is nice.
I did the HKG-BKK EK flight in A380 F a few years ago. I think I paid something like US$650 for that leg.
It's not intra-European and it may not technically be a fifth freedom route, but I have always been intrigued by the JFK-Riga sector of Uzbekistan Airlines' flight to Tashkent.
@Ben L, B Owen: there was never any LHR-AMS. They flew to Gatwick, not Heathrow
Hey Ben, Great post!
What is the "cheapest" way to book the Ethiopian and Korean flight?
Thank you.
@B Owen
Yeah, first of all, it's LGW. And second, the airline will end that route as of March 30th, as they begin five-weekly Jakarta-Singapore-London Heathrow-Jakarta service.
Hey Lucky.
Neither the Korean or Singapore flight shows up in ITA Matrix with an F cabin, only J for sale.
Only F cabin 5 freedom that is bookable in Europe is the Emirates LCA-MLA A340 on MON and WED.
MAD-FRA on LAN is amazing. I've flown it now once and booked it again for 136 eur(all-in, one way) in business class. Truly good value for money!
I just booked the LAN MAD-FRA flight, one way, too! I was trying to figure out how to get from southern France near Spain to Germany for my return flight, and this worked out the be the cheapest AND best option!! Perfect timing! 🙂
Alright, I'm an idiot.
Could someone please enlighten me on the derivation of the term "fifth freedom"? What does "fifth" refer to? And what's the deal with "freedom"?
How did this term come to be?
What about MXP-BCN with SQ? I know SQ can't sell seats on that segment alone, but as passengers can embark and disembark in MXP as the flight continues from/to BCN, doesn't that make it a fifth freedom route?
Planning a Madrid trip this year with hopes of doing LH F ex-FRA. LAN J looks like a great positioning flight, hahah.
@No Name
Flew the first half of that route, DXB-LCA last year on an old A330 in F. The service was true EK first class, including Dom, but the hard product was nothing to get excited about (except the novelty factor). No suites on that route. Still, for a regional route, compared to even QR and GF who operate narrowbodies on the same route, it was quite nice.
@AKGuy - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedoms_of_the_air
Taking EK CHC/SYD in a few weeks. That will be my first 'fifth freedom' route without continuing on to the flights eventual destination.
F was only about twice the price of Y, so a nice chance to check out EK F if only for 3 hours or so.
LAN is pricing out $248 RT in J from FRA to MAD. That is an awesome deal for 2.5 hour flight.
I went on BA SIN to SYD on redemption F. It was my first ever Fcl trip, I was greatly disappointed. But maybe that's why I enjoyed my return trip on QF so much. Looking forward to my next 5th trip, EK HKGBKK,vv
Adding to the mix:
EK LCA-ATH-LCA on a 3-class 777, 5 times a week
BTW:
@antiregime : Who actually flies ATH-MAN? I wasn't aware of that one! Your point on 8th freedom is an interesting one. But I believe those are still 5th freedoms. In the EU, a single aviation market does not mean a single country.
@AKguy: http://www.lmgtfy.com/?q=fifth+freedom+rights 🙂
@AKGuy see http://www.icao.int/Pages/freedomsAir.aspx or https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedoms_of_the_air
@Jordan MXP-BCN is not a fifth freedom because it cannot be purchased as a stand-alone flight. Instead that is third freedom (or fourth freedom in reverse direction).
Note there are many tag leg flights which cannot be purchased as a stand-alone flight.
Hi Lucky,
Appreciate if you could come up with some of your preferred routes within Asia. Thanks
AK Guy
First freedom: to fly over a territory without landing.
Second freedom: to land in a territory for non traffic purposes, such as refuelling or maintenance.
Third freedom: to take traffic (passengers or cargo) from the airline's home country to another state.
Fourth freedom: to take traffic from a country to the airline's home country.
Fifth freedom: an airline enroute to or from its home state can take traffic from a second state to a third state.
@Ben. How is it beneficial for Korean to do such a 5th freedom route? Not enough business going back from Vienna to Seoul Direct? Probably other asian traffic routing through Seoul to go to Vienna is my guess.
@JJ The purpose of fifth freedom flights in many cases is to combine two marginal routes into a direct flight that has sufficient yield. This is achieved by selling 3 different markets for the same flight. AAA-BBB, AAA-CCC and BBB-CCC.
Some fifth freedom flights are due to nonstop flights being non-viable (impossible or insufficient yield due to capacity constraints to fly the distance). In these cases the fifth freedom leg provides a revenue top-up but is not the main driver for the transit stop.
Hi Lucky -
This is slightly off-topic, but there are two Fifth Freedom routes in South America that I'm finding very helpful: EZE-GRU on QR, and EZE-SCL on KL. When local carriers are offering narrow bodies, often with coach only, these 777s with real business class make a difference.
Not Europe, but LAN and Emirates offer 5th freedom flights between SYD and AKL, both directions. Have done both, last year. They are very popular and offer up a stack of QF (code-share) SCs too!
The Korean Vienna-Zurich flight can be booked, even in economy class. The catch though is that it is not sold on either the Korean website or most travel agency websites. If however you phone Korean and ask nicely, they will still sell you a one-way ticket. I think this leg operates only in winter, not in summer. It's priced on the expensive side compared to Swiss or Austrian.
Separately, there's another 5th freedom route in Europe - Belavia's flights between Budapest and Belgrade. Has the additional benefit of getting to fly with Belavia without having to get a visa for Belarus. Then again, most people reading this post would probably be quite keen to go to Belarus and try to fly on some old Soviet-era aircraft.
Some 5th freedom flights I took:
Ethiopian flies ICN HKG
BA flies WDH JNB
Swiss flies DUB MCT
Hmm, are you sure they (ET) will have traffic rights on that (BRU-MAN)? They currently fly BRU-VIE-ADD but they don't have traffic rights on the BRU-VIE leg.
What about (Belarusian airline) Belavia’s flight between Budapest and Belgrade?