Air India is going through a massive transformation at the moment. In late 2021, the airline was privatized, with Tata Group, the company that founded Air India, once again being in control of the national carrier, and trying to bring it back to its former glory.
As you’d expect, this is no small task, given how much worse the airline became over the decades. In early 2023, Air India placed a record-breaking aircraft order, picking up 470 jets from Airbus and Boeing. The airline has now disclosed that it has increased this order by an additional 100 jets, bringing Air India’s order total to 570 jets.
In this post:
Air India picks up more A320s & A350s
In early 2023, Air India placed the following aircraft order with Airbus and Boeing:
- Air India announced plans to purchase 250 Airbus jets, including 140 A320neos, 70 A321neos, six A350-900s, and 34 A350-1000s
- Air India announced plans to purchase 220 Boeing jets, including 190 737 MAXs (including the -8 and -10 series), 20 787-9s, and 10 777-9s
Air India’s Airbus order has evolved quite a bit, including switching around the variants of aircraft it ordered, plus increasing the total number of planes on order. Air India’s Airbus order is now comprised of 350 jets, including 105 Airbus A320neos, 195 A321neos, 25 A350-900s, and 25 A350-1000s
The evolution of this order is quite interesting:
- When it comes to narrow body aircraft, Air India has heavily modified its A320neo-family order to be more focused on the larger A321neo variant than the smaller A320neo variant
- When it comes to wide body aircraft, Air India was initially all-in on the larger A350-1000 variant, but ultimately decided to significantly increase its A350-900 order as well
Note that six of the A350-900s that were ordered have already been delivered, as these are the jets that were intended for Aeroflot, but couldn’t be delivered due to sanctions.
My take on Air India’s evolving Airbus order
With Air India’s updated Airbus order, I find it interesting how the airline has become more focused on the larger aircraft variant for narrow body jets, while it has become more focused on the smaller aircraft variant for wide body jets.
Obviously larger aircraft variants have lower per-seat costs — both the A321neo and A350-1000 have incredibly good economics, since they only have incrementally higher fuel burn than the smaller variants.
The question, of course, is if airlines can fly larger aircraft variants without it impacting yields. Those incremental seats are only worth something if you can fill them, and in particular, if you can do so without having to charge lower fares.
I see both sides here. On the one hand, India is an aviation market growing at an incredibly fast pace, and as Indian carriers try to reclaim market share from Gulf carriers, you’d think there would be no end to demand. On the other hand, even in markets where demand is increasing significantly, airlines do consistently struggle with filling larger aircraft variants.
Air India’s Airbus order is definitely now more “balanced” than it was back when it was first placed, as initially the only A350-900 jets were going to be the ones that were intended for Aeroflot.
Bottom line
Air India has increased its order for Airbus jets. The airline has boosted the order from 350 jets to 450 jets, and has also changed up the variants on order. Air India is now more focused on the A321neo (rather than the A320neo), while the airline has also boosted its A350-900 order (while decreasing its A350-1000 order).
What do you make of Air India’s incremental Airbus order?
ORDER AT LEAST ( 100 ) B 787 - 9 AND ( 100 ) A 350 - 900 MORE AS SOON AS POSSIBLE .
Still a bad airline. Brand new A350s don't do anything if you can't fix the overall mediocre product and don't maintain your seats.
Various data points say the new seats already show signs of heavy wear/tear as well as mechanical issues.
The comment reading here is just so funny
What remains to be seen is how many of the new A321neos on order get a new business-class product like what ex-Vistara A321neos do, or even better. I’m sure AI will not skimp on that as much as it has done on the IFE-less A320neo, with its tight 28” of pitch. It may take a few more years for that to be revealed, but with over half of the orders being A321neos (including A321XLRs), AI...
What remains to be seen is how many of the new A321neos on order get a new business-class product like what ex-Vistara A321neos do, or even better. I’m sure AI will not skimp on that as much as it has done on the IFE-less A320neo, with its tight 28” of pitch. It may take a few more years for that to be revealed, but with over half of the orders being A321neos (including A321XLRs), AI knows only too well the value of a premium narrowbody product.
More EskiMason responses coming in 3, 2, 1...
Eskimo/Mason endlessly dragging on their beef is genuinely exhausting. Frankly, no one else cares. We got both review trips and both were interesting. I am not sobbing that one was slightly later. Move on
Though of course Ben thought flying KE and JAL would be much more worthwhile than flying an on-its-way-out Vistara in October — and many agree that JAL has now become an absolutely brilliant airline in 2024 — I really appreciate all the coverage Ben has given for AI and Vistara, even without flying them.
I have to (somewhat) agree with your other comment below that AI will not become much more than a KE or...
Though of course Ben thought flying KE and JAL would be much more worthwhile than flying an on-its-way-out Vistara in October — and many agree that JAL has now become an absolutely brilliant airline in 2024 — I really appreciate all the coverage Ben has given for AI and Vistara, even without flying them.
I have to (somewhat) agree with your other comment below that AI will not become much more than a KE or TG (if not as poor as the US3 or, even worse, the CN3) at best, despite being partly owned by SQ!
yeah, this is absolutely true, I think with the influence of SQ, AI does have hope getting past the CN3 and probably will be better, but I pointed to the CN3...
yeah, this is absolutely true, I think with the influence of SQ, AI does have hope getting past the CN3 and probably will be better, but I pointed to the CN3 in particular because of the similar demographics -- just like the CN3, because India has a huge population with very different needs than the average connecting traveler, you'll get an airline that's very much tailored to the local market and doesn't necessarily work as well for foreigners. Same thing as the difference between the local-market-focused CN3 and neighboring Cathay Pacific, or similarly Saudia v. the ME3
@quorumcall
That's because "everyone else" knows that Proximanova is playing victim.
He made Ben to change his trip itineraru last minute.
He made Ben to go through a sh*tty flight experience.
He made Ben to take a long trip twice in a short time period.
He even mocked Ben after knowing that Copa experience is a total sh*t.
How sad that you're blindfolded from those truths.
Proximanova's victim propaganda definitely works.
More accounts, more upvotes for the troll comments. Two or more can play at that game!
@Proximanova
Says the one who gave up your Diamond VT-CIE after a bashing that you provided the cause.
And you keep self liking your comments too.
Keep the hypocrisy going.
@Iris
Are you trying to copy me, writing in my exact tone?
I don't know is that a sarcasm or a support, but either way no thanks.
Not here to have some apologists like BA and AeroB13a.
Air India's future, to me, seems similar to a Chinese Big 3 carrier (like China Eastern or something). Sure, it's going to be better than the Air India we had in 2019 that was a constant mess, and we'll move past 2-3-2 biz, but they're never going to excel, just be a mediocre-to-bad mass market carrier propped up by the jingoistic religious customers you see out of India these days. I had someone assert to...
Air India's future, to me, seems similar to a Chinese Big 3 carrier (like China Eastern or something). Sure, it's going to be better than the Air India we had in 2019 that was a constant mess, and we'll move past 2-3-2 biz, but they're never going to excel, just be a mediocre-to-bad mass market carrier propped up by the jingoistic religious customers you see out of India these days. I had someone assert to me that 2019 Air India was the best carrier in the world, and no one had any reason to prefer a Gulf carrier or SQ over that. AI will have a stranglehold over those people
Indians love to have an opinion on everything but vote with their wallets when it matters. So there is no stranglehold on any customer segment.
In my opinion, the 321 has been ordered for covering high volume domestic routes out of airports like BOM which have no capacity. Plus the short haul international routes like BOM - DXB or MAA / BLR - SIN / KUL. Many will be configured to take on Indigo.
This is a correct analysis, I don't think anyone will go out of their way to fly Air India, similar to Chinese airlines, unless they are Indian nationals and other Indians in the VFR bucket for the non-stop flights, and it will be fueled by their massive 1B+ population sizes for passenger traffic.
the real question is how long this makes the Airbus production lists and when the first significant openings occur.
Having large narrowbodies and standard size widebodies is generally in line with what the US has. Both India and the US have multiple hubs compared to Europe and E. Asian countries that typically have one or potentially two hubs in the country.
What a nice news to start a week, because we can "visualise ourselves flying new Air India or Safran Unity or AIC or something of that kind ;)" on board their grim A320s and 777s even harder with those more jets to arrive.
Too bad that Vistara is now a part of an airline keep telling their customers about their fake ambitions, just like the man who told us the wisdom of "visualising".
Matter of time for AI A350s also start to fall apart.
Wonderful opportunity.
More like almost 500 A320+737 family opportunities to visualise.
As **insert your next new made up username here** wisdom advice would suggest just fly a 737, "visualise yourself flying Qsuites or Air France or JAL or something of that kind! ;)"
And VT-CIE, time to visualise your next username.
Hint: Don't use alphabet poop.