Qatar Airways is the world’s 10th-largest international airline on July 29th, 2021, if measured in total movements. And it is the largest located in Asia-Pacific. We explore the carrier’s operation on this specific day and find that 87% of its movements are by widebodies.
Qatar Airways has 324 movements (departures and arrives combined) to 112 destinations from its Doha hub today, July 29th, 2021. These 324 movements generate most 89,000 seats for an average of about 275 seats per flight, based on analyzing schedules information from OAG.
The high seats per flight is clearly from widebodies flying a significant 87% of its all seats on this day, with the B777-300ER alone responsible for nearly half. The B787-8, A350-900, A350-1000, B777-200LR, and B787-9 – in that order – follow in the most-used list.
Widebodies pushing up seats per flight
The impact of such strong use of widebodies can be seen geographically, as illustrated in the following figure. Given COVID, Qatar Airways uses them more than ever to offset lower frequencies due to ongoing restrictions and cargo-carrying capability.
Stay aware: Sign up for our weekly new routes newsletter.
This is seen within the Middle East. While this region now has 263 seats per flight, that’s up from fewer than 200 in July 2019. But it isn’t just about widebodies, with the following table indicating that the use of narrowbodies to Africa and Europe is influenced by narrowbodies. Indeed, narrowbodies are important for growing Qatar Airways’ network, especially to secondary destinations and growing connectivity.
Movements (departures/arrivals) | Seats | Seats per flight | |
---|---|---|---|
Europe | 88 | 21,866 | 248 |
Asia-Pacific | 79 | 24,525 | 310 |
Middle East | 67 | 17,649 | 263 |
Africa | 54 | 13,317 | 247 |
North America | 34 | 10,686 | 314 |
South America | 2 | 654 |