A lot is changing at Scandinavian Airlines (SAS) right now. The airline has emerged from bankruptcy protection, has a new investment from Air France-KLM, and has left Star Alliance and joined SkyTeam. The airline has now announced its newest long haul route, and it shouldn’t come as much of a surprise.
In this post:
SAS launching Copenhagen to Seoul Incheon route
SAS will launch year-round flights between Copenhagen (CPH) and Seoul Incheon (ICN), operating 4x weekly in summer and 3x weekly in winter. The new service will operate as of September 12, 2025, with the following schedule:
SK987 Copenhagen to Seoul Incheon departing 11:40PM arriving 6:15PM (+1 day)
SK988 Seoul Incheon to Copenhagen departing 11:45PM arriving 6:05AM (+1 day)
The 4,937-mile flight is blocked at 11hr35min eastbound and 13hr20min westbound. SAS will use an Airbus A350-900 for the route, featuring 300 seats. This includes 40 business class seats, 32 premium economy seats, and 228 economy seats. This will be SAS’ first time flying to South Korea.
Here’s how SAS CEO Anko van der Werff describes this development:
“This new route highlights our commitment to meeting customer demand and enhancing connectivity between two dynamic regions. Seoul, renowned as a global center of culture, innovation, and business, is a strategic addition to our growing network. As a proud SkyTeam member, this route further strengthens the seamless connectivity we provide, linking Scandinavia to key destinations across the globe. We are excited to welcome passengers on board this landmark service.”
This seems like a safe, logical route addition
I think flights to Seoul Incheon are about the most logical route that SAS could add, if looking at eastbound long haul service. Keep in mind that SAS is also currently trying to build up Copenhagen as an intercontinental hub, after previously also operating quite a few flights out of Oslo (OSL) and Stockholm (ARN).
Most significantly, Seoul Incheon is a Korean Air hub, so this service won’t just serve the point-to-point market, but will also allow connections at both hubs. So there will be plenty of connections in Europe and Asia, and the flights are timed to maximize that (with the biggest limitation being the arrival time at Incheon).
Currently SAS’ only other routes to the Far East are a year-round service to Tokyo Haneda (HND), and a seasonal flight to Bangkok (BKK). The carrier’s network to Asia used to be bigger, but of course not being able to use Russian airspace has been a major challenge for the carrier, and has limited the ability to operate these routes profitably.
SkyTeam member Virgin Atlantic is also expected to launch Seoul Incheon flights eventually, as a concession for the Korean Air and Asiana merger being approved. It remains to be seen when that happens, though.
Bottom line
As of September 2025, SAS plans to launch year-round flights between Copenhagen and Seoul Incheon using Airbus A350s. SAS’ network to Asia is much smaller than in the past, so flying to the hub of another SkyTeam carrier is the most logical destination in Asia to expand to.
What do you make of SAS adding Seoul Incheon flights?
As an ICN-based pax who just started SAS's Million Mile challenge, I couldn't be more excited for this announcement.
in other aviation news, hopefully Ben can do a story or two about the dual ground collisions involving 4 aircraft and 4 airlines at BOS yesterday.
While Seoul serves as an important TPAC hub, it could not serve as a hub for Asia-Europe routes due to its location. Only passengers to/from secondary cities in Japan and maybe Philippines would choose ICN over other NE Asia hubs like PVG/HKG.
Except there are no direct flights from Copenhagen to Hong Kong or Shanghai. One stop connection via ICN or a two stop via Hong Kong or Shanghai?
Singapore or Bangkok on SQ or TG are other options one stop. Or the ME3
Since when is Hong Kong in northeast Asia? Or even Shanghai, for that matter.
Isn't everything going to be two stop anyways? European feed into CPH into ICN into final Asia destination vice versa.
From Wikipedia: East Asia is a geographical and cultural region of Asia including China, Japan, Mongolia, North Korea, South Korea, and Taiwan
"The carrier’s network to Asia used to be bigger, but of course not being able to use Russian airspace has been a major challenge for the carrier...."
This route information is at odds with the diagramatic route shown elsewhere in this post. So, what is it; flight largely over Russia, or skirting around the evil empire?
That's not an actual route map though, is it? Just the most direct route between the two airports overplayed on a map.
SAS never flew a number of intercontinental routes from Oslo, just New York (still operated) and for a short periode Miami. Stockholm had more intercontinental flights
@Ben - do you think this will actually be launched in September if they still cannot overfly Russia at the time?
there are many flights from western Europe to NE Asia that operate now with the Russia airspace restrictions in place; it simply adds flying time but a hub to hub route is the best way to maximize revenue and offset the higher costs.
KE will probably start discussions about JVs on some of these new routes to ICN - with VS to LHR and SK to CPH - as soon as the merger is fully approved and the timeline and details for phasing out OZ are finalized.