Etihad Airways has just announced its newest destination in the United States (in addition to announcing a Boeing aircraft order). The airline is currently undergoing a major expansion, and it seems like the airline is adding at least one new destination in the United States per year. However, the latest new route isn’t necessarily what you’d expect.
In this post:
Etihad’s Abu Dhabi to Charlotte flight launches May 2026
As of May 4, 2026, Etihad will launch a new 4x flight between Abu Dhabi (AUH) and Charlotte (CLT), operating with the following schedule:
EY15 Abu Dhabi to Charlotte departing 3:15AM arriving 10:15AM
EY16 Charlotte to Abu Dhabi departing 2:40PM arriving 12:25PM (+1 day)
The route will operate 4x weekly in both directions, on Sundays, Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. The 7,408-mile flight is blocked at 15hr westbound and 13hr45min eastbound.
Etihad will use a two-cabin Boeing 787-9 for the route, including 28 business class seats and 262 economy class seats. As you’d expect, this flight will use the US CBP Preclearance facility in Abu Dhabi. The new flight is bookable, directly through etihad.com, or via your preferred online travel agency.
Here’s how Etihad CEO Antonoaldo Neves describes this service:
“Charlotte represents a strategic addition to our U.S. network, unlocking direct access to one of the country’s most dynamic and fast-growing regions. We’re excited to be the first airline from our region to serve this market, and we look forward to connecting more travellers to Abu Dhabi and beyond.”
How Charlotte fits into Etihad’s route network
Charlotte will be Etihad’s sixth destination in the United States, after Atlanta (ATL), Boston (BOS), Chicago (ORD), New York (JFK), and Washington (IAD). Etihad’s Atlanta route launches as of July 2025, while the Boston route launched as of March 2024.
I’ve gotta say, the Charlotte addition is an interesting one. Obviously Charlotte is a fortress hub for American, and Etihad and American do have a partnership (though American has a much closer partnership with Qatar Airways).
What’s interesting is that in announcing this route, Etihad doesn’t mention American once. Instead it just mentions how Charlotte is a fast growing market, and how this route will enable one-stop connectivity between Charlotte and the world. Etihad is the first airline from the region to serve Charlotte, so I find this all to be quite unusual.
On the one hand, I guess there’s merit to flying to a destination where there’s not yet competition from Gulf carriers. At the same time, if Qatar Airways has passed on serving Charlotte, then you can’t help but wonder what Etihad sees in the market:
- Qatar Airways has a much larger connecting network than Etihad, making it easier to fill planes
- American’s partnership with Qatar Airways is much closer than it is with Etihad, so there are more commercial opportunities for Qatar Airways
Etihad seems to have no interest in expanding to west of the Mississippi River, as the airline never restored service to Dallas (DFW), Los Angeles (LAX), and San Francisco (SFO). I’m not necessarily saying that’s the wrong move, since the economics of ultra long haul flying can be tough. But at a minimum, it’s an unusual strategy.
What’s also funny is that when Etihad announced Atlanta flights, I wondered if it would mean that Etihad would finally change its partnership, and that we might see Delta and Etihad finally launch a collaboration, perhaps at the expense of American’s partnership with Etihad.
That didn’t end up materializing, but Etihad does still seem to be pursuing service to airline fortress hubs, regardless.
Bottom line
As of May 2026, Etihad will launch 4x weekly flights between Abu Dhabi and Charlotte with Boeing 787s. The route will operate 4x weekly. I’ve gotta say, Charlotte wasn’t on my bingo card for Etihad’s next US destination. I can understand this in terms of connectivity to and from American, but interestingly, American isn’t mentioned once in the press release about the new route.
What do you make of Etihad launching Charlotte flights?
I have to imagine the Ratliffes will choose this flight instead of flying through Doha next time. I fear they won’t be sitting in the front this time around.
People are forgetting that quietly Etihad has also built a significant presence in India. Unless I am mistaken, together with their majority owned Air Arabia franchise, they are more than double the size of Qatar to India. On routes like BOM and DEL, Etihad has 4 times more flights than Qatar's own metal.
I just realized you can earn/burn American miles on Etihad. This is going to be also a big advantage for Etihad. Honestly, between this, USA pre clearance, and the natural growth in the NC area, I agree with some that this might be the most shrewd network decision I have seen in a while. Why go after the same old stuff?
Etihad management is clearly nimble. If it does not work, they would pull,...
I just realized you can earn/burn American miles on Etihad. This is going to be also a big advantage for Etihad. Honestly, between this, USA pre clearance, and the natural growth in the NC area, I agree with some that this might be the most shrewd network decision I have seen in a while. Why go after the same old stuff?
Etihad management is clearly nimble. If it does not work, they would pull, and it would be a lesson. Clearly, their financial performance has given them some self confidence!
3:15 am is a pretty brutal departure time. Does that even make sense for most connections? Seems like you’ll have a long layover. Could maybe work for Australia but easier just to fly through west coast than AUH
3:15 AM in Abu Dhabl. That’s not unusual for departures in that region.
Being CLT based, I've been hoping Qatar would come in here but I'm nearly as excited about Etihad as I would've been with Qatar. I'd rather have Qatar's business class seating and service but Abu Dhabi pre-clearance has been super easy each time I've used it so I consider that a positive in favor or Etihad. I'm extremely happy with this news.
Smart move on Etihad. They surely will attract a lot of business people flying to Asia and the Middle East.
American is way behind on customer service, aircraft comfort and food. Etihad represents an attractive options for
Those business dollars. There will
Not be a shortage of demand. Lufthansa is a good option out Charlotte. And it is not the banking industry which fuels the growth. Employees of the automotive industry and...
Smart move on Etihad. They surely will attract a lot of business people flying to Asia and the Middle East.
American is way behind on customer service, aircraft comfort and food. Etihad represents an attractive options for
Those business dollars. There will
Not be a shortage of demand. Lufthansa is a good option out Charlotte. And it is not the banking industry which fuels the growth. Employees of the automotive industry and related businesses occupy many of these business class seats.
If past experience is any indication, Etihad’s pricing also will be more favorable than American’s.
About two or three years ago, there had been signage at LAX to suggest that Etihad was going to return. Subsequently, it released its lounge space at LAX -- which is now occupied by Virgin. Given that as well as starting service to these feeder hubs in the East, it might be a while before service is restored to LAX and SFO.
I think one reason Qatar probably passed on CLT is because they don't need the connectivity from American over there since they fly to basically every other AA hub in the country (aside from Phoenix), so that crowd has no value for a QR CLT flight. Meanwhile, for Etihad, they can tap into the local demand with no competition and also have the value of connectivity from CLT, allowing them access to many more US...
I think one reason Qatar probably passed on CLT is because they don't need the connectivity from American over there since they fly to basically every other AA hub in the country (aside from Phoenix), so that crowd has no value for a QR CLT flight. Meanwhile, for Etihad, they can tap into the local demand with no competition and also have the value of connectivity from CLT, allowing them access to many more US airports with connections on AA which aren't available from their current US destinations (or it offers better connections instead of ORD). I agree that it isn't the next route I expected from Etihad, but it is interesting nonetheless.
Love this for Etihad (and the people of NC). Still bamboozled at the new destinations teaser they put out last year clearly hinting at Philadelphia as their next US destination only for them to instead announce Atlanta and then Charlotte? Fun, wild times at EY.
They're capitalizing on the fact that NC is now one of the states that has a large South Asian population, but am surprised they're going to CLT instead of RDU. Most of the traffic will be between CLT and India.
CLT is significantly larger than RDU still.
It is a great move. We always have to travel to IAD or JFK with connections. This is going to serve NC, SC travelers like us that connects to Asian routes from Middle Eastern carriers.
I live in CLT and super excited about this addition. It will do well, in my opinion. Last summer was on a delayed flight from CLT-JFK. When we arrived the AA flight to New Delhi was leaving in about 40 minutes. Flight attendant announced to please allow the people heading to New Delhi to get off first due to tight connection. They said there were 48 people connecting to New Delhi. I think it will do well with connecting demand to SE Asia and the Indian subcontinent.
I think there's a strong chance that it works out. In addition to the AA connection, CLT is filled with very affluent young folks who have a lot of disposable income. Fifteen years ago, this would have made no sense, but I can totally see it now. There is a ridiculous amount of money in CLT these days, and those people love to travel. I think there's more O&D potential than many here think.
Sorry, but I see this failing badly. CLT is too small of an O&D market to support a fairly specialized long haul international flight like this. And, yeah, NC is growing. But that's the entire state in aggregate. While CLT is growing too, it's not that big on it's own. Nor is CLT the kind of hub that would feed much traffic into this. It's a head scratcher, honestly.
Personally, I thing EY would...
Sorry, but I see this failing badly. CLT is too small of an O&D market to support a fairly specialized long haul international flight like this. And, yeah, NC is growing. But that's the entire state in aggregate. While CLT is growing too, it's not that big on it's own. Nor is CLT the kind of hub that would feed much traffic into this. It's a head scratcher, honestly.
Personally, I thing EY would be far better off looking at markets like LAX, SFO, IAH, etc than a place like CLT. And, again, no offense to Charlotte - but Ethiad is a less known carrier based in a less known (to most Americans) city.
It's not about the Charlotte market per se. It's that CLT is a feeder Hub for AA. Just like ATL for Delta, ORD for United, and BOS for JetBlue. It seems pretty clear what they're doing.
Charlotte is the second largest banking hub in the US.
That may be quite true, but it's also a regional hub. PHX is a bigger market and I dont see Etihad setting up shop there any time soon. The fact that "the region" is fast growing doesn't really apply here; Etihad needs a pretty niche market for this flight and it's just too small in this case. More flights to more well-traveled markets may be warranted, though AA feeds plenty via PHL. There's no need...
That may be quite true, but it's also a regional hub. PHX is a bigger market and I dont see Etihad setting up shop there any time soon. The fact that "the region" is fast growing doesn't really apply here; Etihad needs a pretty niche market for this flight and it's just too small in this case. More flights to more well-traveled markets may be warranted, though AA feeds plenty via PHL. There's no need for this route. Mark my words, it's dumb and they'll regret not doing LAX or SFO instead.
It's quite specifically because there is no one else doing this kind of service that Etihad is entering.
The planes could be bigger and fly more often from SFO/LAX, but your yields will be lower from the increased competition.
Do you really think Etihad hasn't done any level of analysis and that they should listen to internet network planner "stogieguy7" instead?
I obviously don’t have the data but I’m surprised Qatar hasn’t entered the market yet. Connectivity with AA and there’s an underserved market for those in NC trying to go to the Middle East and Asia. Or even AA entering the route like they do in PHL when they get more wide bodies.
Not at all surprising. CLT has a huge, growing Indian diaspora.
@ RC -- Yeah, I suspect Lufthansa's CLT-MUC service will suffer most because of this, given the amount of connecting traffic to India, plus Lufthansa's lack of partnerships in Charlotte.
Ben, LH's service has always been held up by the banking industry in CLT. Can't imagine it going away, though I'm not an expert.
Maybe, but not sure this is enough to sustain this route - I suspect the pattern for the diaspora travel is mostly once a year, economy class, whoever offers the cheapest ticket.
Perhaps this is targeting banking traffic?
I came here to comment the exact same thing. the flight timing is probably optimized for all onward connectivity to the subcontinent.
This is what I've been saying in all your articles.
The CLT metro is growing very fast. North Carolina as a whole is just behind Florida and Texas in terms of net migration within the states. It's still a more medium sized city today, but there's tons of potential.
Given Etihad is a longhaul focused connecting airline, it's not unreasonable to expect RDU residents to make the two to three hour drive to CLT to...
This is what I've been saying in all your articles.
The CLT metro is growing very fast. North Carolina as a whole is just behind Florida and Texas in terms of net migration within the states. It's still a more medium sized city today, but there's tons of potential.
Given Etihad is a longhaul focused connecting airline, it's not unreasonable to expect RDU residents to make the two to three hour drive to CLT to catch a one-stop flight to anywhere in the world.
I believe even Turkish also had CLT on the shortlist for future expansion.
EY is much smaller than QR or EK. It doesn't really connect you "to anywhere in the world".
This flight is going to struggle. It will depend mostly on O&D it seems, and CLT doesn't generate enough for even the long haul flights AA runs from there. It's all about connections there. This route is simply illogical.
Agreed. CLT doesn't have BA, AF, TK, KL, QR, EI, IB, etc. Lufthansa is the only Euro/Asian carrier with service and that's due to the auto industry.
Clearly literally no one else sees demand
It will do fine. 4x weekly is conservative, 787-9 capacity is much leaner. Amongst the top 20 CSAs, CLT lags only behind Orlando, Dallas, and Houston. The RDU Triangle area is also yet another growth leader, and is only about 2 hours away from CLT, and will likely get a fairly decent amount of travelers booking this Etihad service.
Broadly speaking, NC is trending up population wise and economically, it's the 9th largest in the...
It will do fine. 4x weekly is conservative, 787-9 capacity is much leaner. Amongst the top 20 CSAs, CLT lags only behind Orlando, Dallas, and Houston. The RDU Triangle area is also yet another growth leader, and is only about 2 hours away from CLT, and will likely get a fairly decent amount of travelers booking this Etihad service.
Broadly speaking, NC is trending up population wise and economically, it's the 9th largest in the US, and likely will end up 6th or 7th by the end of the decade. A year from now when it starts service, it'll have increased in all the important metrics.
Etihad has been much more calculated in its growth plans, and this a play to get the first mover advantage and establish itself on this route as a viable connecting option to its very large network across the globe.
What are you talking about? The AA transatlantic flights out of CLT have done very well. I am not sure what the revenue per seat mile is but every flight is full and the fares are absurd. This is why AA continues to add transatlantic flights from CLT, including Athens this past year. CLT serves all the demand from the SE which has been an exploding region in terms of population the last several years.