This Is Air Canada's Most Popular Flight To Europe

The Trans-Atlantic market is among the busiest in the world, with the majority of market shares held by major international carriers either competing against each other (alliance vs. alliance) or airlines complementing each other’s networks (joint ventures and partnerships) to boost connectivity. A key player within the market is the Star Alliance member and largest Canadian carrier, Air Canada.

With the airline’s operations split across Canada, it operates a total of 1,365 one-way flights (Canada to Europe) in September to 28 European destinations from six Canadian airports. While some routes are operated only at certain times a week, others are served up to four times a day.

The Most Popular Destination

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Looking at the scheduled data for September on OAG for Air Canada, it is not surprising that London Heathrow Airport(LHR), being the busiest airport in Europe, comes out on top. With the airline operating 269 flights (in one direction) from six Canadian points, it accounts for 19.7% of the carrier’s total European operation.

The airline serves this destination with a variety of aircraft, including Boeing 777s, Boeing 787s, Airbus A330-300s, and operates a daily service using the carrier’s narrowbody, Boeing 737 MAX 8s. The operations are split as follows:

As seen above, the majority of Air Canada’s operations to LHR are flown from Toronto Pearson International Airport(YYZ). While the 777s fly most of the YYZ-LHR flights, scheduled data indicate that the carrier’s next-generation Boeing 787-9s undertake the majority of Air Canada’s overall operations to Heathrow.

Amidst the airline’s widebody operations, as stated above, Air Canada also operates a daily flight to LHR using its fleet of Boeing 737 MAX 8s from Halifax Stanfield International Airport (YHZ).

Facing Competition

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As with any competitive market, Air Canada faces competition from both sides of the Atlantic on its services to and from Heathrow on four of its routes.

As shown by the data above, Air Canada faces significant competition on three of these routes from British Airways. More importantly, the YYZ-LHR route, which sees the highest competition, is also the route that has the presence of airlines from all three major alliances. While Air Canada represents Star Alliance, British Airways and Virgin Atlantic represent oneworld and SkyTeam alliances, respectively.

This goes back to the aforementioned market competition and inter-airline network complementing strategies employed by airlines. Therefore, even though there are only three carriers operating on this route, they are potentially providing connections for passengers from dozens of different airlines across all three alliances that cannot effectively compete in this market on their own.For example, oneworld member Qantas allows passengers to book British Airways flights on YYZ-LHR routes, or KLM allows its passengers to book Virgin Atlantic flights on the LHR-YYZ route on its own website, as both carriers are part of the SkyTeam alliance.

Two Other UK Airports Make The List

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Apart from London Heathrow, Air Canada also operates flights to two other destinations within the UK. One being Manchester Airport in England, and the other being the capital of Scotland, Edinburgh. However, these operations are not as impressive as those of Air Canada’s flights to LHR, as Manchester Airport was scheduled to see 12 flights in September, while Edinburgh saw 32 flights.

Data show that of the 32 Air Canada flights to Edinburgh, 29 were operated from Toronto Airport with Boeing 787s, while the remaining three flights were operated from Montreal using Boeing 737 MAX 8s. In the case of Manchester Airport, all 12 flights were from Toronto utilizing the Boeing 787 Dreamliners.

While Air Canada was the only carrier operating on the Montreal-Edinburgh route, the carrier faced competition from WestJet on the Toronto-Edinburgh route and Air Transat on the Toronto-Manchester route.

Rather unusually, Air Canada does not operate to a key airport in the UK – London Gatwick Airport (LGW), which many of the other North American carriers do, as a way to expand their North Atlantic operations due to slot restrictions at Heathrow. Excluding any of the US carriers, fellow Canadian carriers, Air Transat and WestJet operate flights to Gatwick. This could potentially be due to frequency limitations set within the Canada-UK Air Service Agreement.

Other Popular European Destinations

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Two other destinations from the list had 100 or more flights scheduled in September: Frankfurt (FRA) in Germany and Paris (CDG) in France. Frankfurt was the second most popular destination, with Air Canada operating 122 flights, split between Toronto (60), Montreal (32), and Vancouver (30). Meanwhile, CDG saw 100 flights, with 60 originating from Montreal and 40 from Toronto.

Flights to Frankfurt (FRA)

Much like the operations to London, Air Canada serves Frankfurt with a variety of widebody aircraft, including the Boeing 777s, Boeing 787s, and the Airbus A330s, with the majority of flights operating from Toronto. Additionally, with Frankfurt being one of Lufthansa’s hubs, which is a fellow Star Alliance member, the two carriers can work in partnership on this route, optimizing connectivity for each of their networks. However, Air Canada does face competition from the German carrier Condor on the Frankfurt services from Toronto and Vancouver.

Apart from Frankfurt, Air Canada and Lufthansa also operate flights on the Toronto-Munich route.

Flights to Paris (CDG)

While Air Canada does operate a considerable number of flights to Paris from Toronto and Montreal, the carrier does face significant competition on these routes, as the airline sees significant competition from Air France and Air Transat on both routes. Other destinations within France that Air Canada flies to include Toulouse (TLS), Nice (NCE), and Lyon (LYS). Flights to these destinations are all operated from Montreal, and Air Canada faces competition from Air Transat on all of these routes.

Air Canada’s European Network

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The following table shows all the European destinations Air Canada operated to during the month of September, along with the number of flights operated by the carrier across the month:

While the network is varied and Air Canada flies to several key hubs within Europe, it is also easy to identify a noticeable pattern, that a portion of these destinations are hubs for fellow Star Alliance members. As previously mentioned, this includes Frankfurt and Munich, which are key hubs for Lufthansa. Other such destinations include Athens, Lisbon, Brussels, Vienna, Zurich, and Geneva, which are hub airports for Aegean Airlines, TAP Air Portugal, Brussels Airlines, Austrian and SWISS International Air Lines.

It is also worth noting that Air Canada will have improved connectivity from Milan, once the Italian carrier ITA becomes a full Star Alliance member in the near future. Ultimately, these partnerships and inter-airline cooperation provide better connectivity for passengers, while the airlines enjoy cost savings by sharing resources and achieving greater economies of scale and extended networks.

In addition to its alliance partners, Air Canada has codeshare partnerships with numerous airlines worldwide. Within Europe, Air Canada has partnerships with Aer Lingus, Edelweiss, Air Baltic, Turkish Airlines, and more.

Further European Network Expansion Plans

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According to the airline’s September press release, the carrier is already planning two new European routes and the return of another route (among others) forSummer 2026. This includes launching routes from Montreal to Catania (CTA) in Italy and Palma de Mallorca (PMI) in Spain. Additionally, the airline is also planning the return of flights from Toronto to Budapest (BUD) in Hungary.

As per OAG’s schedule for Summer 2026 (at the time of writing), data show that the carrier will be returning to BUD with its Boeing 787-9s, operating four flights weekly. As for the new routes, Air Canada is scheduled to operate three weekly flights from Montreal to Catania using the smaller Boeing 787-8, while the carrier will fly to Palma de Mallorca using its fleet of Airbus A321neo narrowbody aircraft four times a week.

Ultimately, with this network expansion plan for next summer, Air Canada will operate flights to over 30 European destinations from six different airports in Canada. With the airline’s alliance and codeshare partners, the carrier will be able to offer an extensive list of European destinations to its customers either directly or with a connecting stop at the hub of their airline partner, using a single itinerary.