New flights from London in 2027: 23 routes with dates and airports

23 routes start from London airports between 4 December 2026 and 3 November 2027, as of November 2026. Three are long-haul firsts for their airline: British Airways to Melbourne (9 January 2027), a British Airways Gatwick triangle to Kilimanjaro and Zanzibar (29 May 2027), and Qantas nonstop to Sydney (October 2027). The other 20 are mostly short-haul, seasonal or thinly scheduled, and the table gives each one's airport, first flight and frequency.

We kept only routes that are new for the airline operating them from that London airport, so a frequency boost, an airport switch or a flight that has already launched does not count. Some of these cities are already served by other airlines. We built this from airline press releases and schedule filings, not from booking each flight.

All 23 new London routes at a glance

Twenty-three new routes start from London airports between 4 December 2026 and 3 November 2027. The table is sorted by London airport, then by first flight, as of November 2026.

Jump to: Heathrow, Gatwick long-haul, Gatwick short-haul, Luton, Southend and Stansted, Sydney.

The chart shows first flights by month, built from airline press releases and schedule filings, November 2026. March 2027 is the busiest month with seven routes, and all seven are TUI launches at Gatwick between 28 and 31 March. No route in our list starts in February, August or September. December counts beOnd as winter 2026, a date the airport has not published.

Heathrow: Melbourne, Bergen and a Maldives route with a stop

Heathrow gets three new routes, each new for its airline there: British Airways to Melbourne from 9 January 2027, British Airways to Bergen from 15 April 2027, and beOnd to the Red Sea and Maldives this winter.

Melbourne via Kuala Lumpur, from 9 January 2027

British Airways flies Heathrow to Melbourne daily, year-round, with a stop in Kuala Lumpur. The airline says the launch is timed for the Australian Open and the Melbourne Grand Prix, and calls it its second route to Australia. Melbourne is new to British Airways, not new to travellers, who can already reach it with a stop on other airlines.

According to British Airways' March release, BA33 leaves Heathrow at 21:10 and reaches Kuala Lumpur at 18:05 the next day. It leaves Kuala Lumpur at 19:45, so the ground time is 1 hour 40 minutes, and lands in Melbourne at 06:40, two calendar days after you left London. BA34 returns from Melbourne at 16:35 and reaches Heathrow at 05:20 the next morning.

Return fares start from £1,110 including taxes, fees and carrier charges, according to British Airways' October release. Four cabins are on sale: World Traveller, World Traveller Plus, Club World and First.

Who it suits: anyone who wants one airline and one ticket to Australia, timed for January sport. Build the trip around the Australian Open or the Grand Prix, the two events British Airways names.

We'd treat the two long sectors as the real cost of this route. The first runs through the night and the second lands at 06:40. That suits a long-haul regular, and it can wear out a first-timer.

Photo: Gracchus250 · CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Bergen, from 15 April 2027

British Airways will fly Heathrow to Bergen five times a week from 15 April to 30 October 2027, from Terminal 3. The airline announced it on 10 November 2026, so this is the freshest route on the list.

Flights run Monday, Wednesday, Thursday, Saturday and Sunday. Per British Airways' 10 November release, BA790 leaves at 07:45 on Mondays and between 08:25 and 08:40 on the other days. That makes a long weekend practical: out at 08:25 on Thursday, back from Bergen at 12:15 on Sunday.

Who it suits: a Norway trip that starts the same morning, with no connection. British Airways also times the flights for onward US connections via Heathrow. We'd use Bergen as a base and add one rail or ferry day rather than a second flight, and we'd avoid the school-holiday weeks.

beOnd to the Red Sea and Maldives, this winter

beOnd is launching three flights a week from Heathrow Terminal 3 to Red Sea in Saudi Arabia, with onward connectivity to the Maldives. Heathrow says the cabin is all-premium, with no economy seating.

Heathrow says passengers can reach the Maldives directly from London in under 13 hours. Schedule filings reported by AeroRoutes list the routing as Male, Red Sea, London Heathrow, so there is a stop at Red Sea. The same filings show the London service starting 16 December 2026 on an A321, but the airport itself only says "launching this winter".

Who it suits: couples spending Maldives money anyway, who value a small cabin more than a cheap seat. We'd skip it if you need a published fare to compare, because the sources we could open give none.

Gatwick: two Zanzibar routes and a Lapland flight

Gatwick has two new routes to Zanzibar, one from British Airways in May 2027 and one from TUI in November 2027, plus a seasonal flight to Rovaniemi this December.

British Airways: the Kilimanjaro and Zanzibar triangle, from 29 May 2027

At 09:05 on Saturday 29 May 2027, a British Airways 777 leaves Gatwick for Kilimanjaro. By 22:25 the same flight number is on the ground in Zanzibar. It is one aircraft on a triangle: Gatwick to Kilimanjaro to Zanzibar and back to Gatwick, three times a week from 29 May to 31 October 2027. All three legs carry the number BA2163.

The outbound leaves Gatwick on Monday, Thursday and Saturday at 09:05 and lands at Kilimanjaro at 20:20. It continues at 21:20 and reaches Zanzibar at 22:25. The same aircraft leaves Zanzibar at 00:25 on Tuesday, Friday and Sunday and lands at Gatwick at 07:55.

That shape builds an open-jaw trip into the schedule: you fly out to Kilimanjaro and come home from Zanzibar, so there is no backtracking. And because the return leaves just after midnight, your last full day in Zanzibar is the day before the date on your ticket.

The middle leg, Kilimanjaro to Zanzibar, leaves at 21:20 on the same three days. BA's release does not say whether that leg can be sold on its own for a safari-then-beach week. We'd confirm it when you search, before building a trip around it.

British Airways says Kilimanjaro is the gateway to the Northern Safari Circuit, which includes the Serengeti and the Ngorongoro Crater. Zanzibar is the beach end.

Who it suits: one-week safari-plus-beach travellers. A Saturday departure and a return ticket dated Friday give five nights plus a last day on the island, since the flight leaves just after midnight.

If you add these flights to an unlocked TripProf trip, timed bookings stay where they are and Autoplan fills the free time between them. Landing at 22:25 and leaving at 00:25 on a Tuesday, Friday or Sunday leaves little free time on the first and last days. Check the departure date on your ticket yourself, because that is the one detail that catches people.

Photo: Meevansjay · CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

TUI: nonstop Gatwick to Zanzibar, from 3 November 2027

TUI's new Gatwick to Zanzibar flight runs twice a week, on Wednesdays and Sundays from 3 November 2027, with the last outbound flight on 22 March 2028. TUI said its winter 2027 programme would go on sale on 2 July 2026. TUI is a package-holiday provider and we found no flight-only fare, so check whether seats can be bought without a hotel.

Who it suits: winter sun rather than safari. It is nonstop, so there is no triangle to think about, but you should confirm that you can book the flight without a package. We'd choose BA for a safari trip and TUI for a beach-only winter week.

Rovaniemi, from 4 December 2026

BA Euroflyer will fly Gatwick to Rovaniemi in Finnish Lapland twice a week, between 4 December and 4 January. British Airways calls it a new route that complements its existing Gatwick to Ivalo service.

Who it suits: families chasing Santa Claus Village over the school holidays. It runs for one month only, so book it first if you are tempted.

Photo: Leonhard Lenz · CC0, via Wikimedia Commons

Sydney nonstop: confirmed for October 2027, with little else

Euronews reports that Qantas has confirmed a nonstop service between Sydney and London from October 2027, flown on an Airbus A350-1000ULR, but no London airport or schedule appears in the coverage we read.

Euronews reports a flight time of 19 to 22 hours and a distance of more than 16,000 kilometres. It also reports that Qantas will take delivery of 12 aircraft in total, each configured with 238 seats. That is a fleet order, not a route allocation.

Who it suits: only people who cannot lose a night to a stopover. We'd wait for a published timetable and fare before planning around it, and use the Melbourne route above if you want an Australia trip that you can actually book today.

Gatwick short-haul: twelve new routes for summer 2027

Gatwick adds twelve new short-haul routes for summer 2027, each new for its airline at Gatwick: eight from TUI, three from easyJet and one from Jet2, starting between 28 March and 30 June 2027.

TUI is the big mover. Trade coverage says the airline is adding eight routes at Gatwick as part of a 17-million-seat summer programme. Santiago de Compostela, Seville and Valencia are the Spanish three. Athens, Mytilene, Palermo, Tangier and Djerba complete the set. These are new to TUI at Gatwick, and other airlines already fly some of these cities from London.

TUI's eight routes, one by one

TUI's eight routes split into three Spanish cities and five Greek, Italian and North African ones. Valencia, five times a week from 28 March, is the most frequent of the new TUI routes. We'd treat it as a long-weekend city break and add a coast day rather than a second city.

Seville (from 30 March) and Santiago de Compostela (from 31 March) both fly three times a week. We'd pair Seville with Cordoba by train. We'd treat Santiago as the end point of a Camino walk if you start in Spain and fly home from there.

Athens flies four times a week from 28 March. Mytilene on Lesvos, Tangier, Palermo and Djerba fly two or three times a week. Those thin schedules mean fewer day choices, so check that the days suit a weekend before you plan one.

Jet2 also flies Gatwick to Mytilene, weekly on Sundays from 2 May 2027, per Travel Weekly in February 2026. Sources differ on the final date (10 or 20 October), so check it before booking. It is one flight a week, so a seven-night holiday is the trip length that works.

easyJet from Gatwick: Cagliari, Girona and Ajaccio

easyJet's Gatwick additions are Cagliari on 1 June, Girona on 3 June and Ajaccio on 30 June 2027. The airline says fares start from £49.48 one way for Girona and Ajaccio, and £51.48 for Cagliari, including taxes.

Girona flies Tuesday, Thursday and Sunday. easyJet says Girona is a new destination for it from the UK. Cagliari flies Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday, which fits a Saturday-to-Tuesday trip. Ajaccio flies Wednesday and Saturday, so a Saturday-to-Wednesday trip is the practical fit.

We'd choose Cagliari for a first Sardinia trip and Ajaccio only if you want Corsica without a ferry. Girona is the easiest of the three for a long weekend.

Photo: Richard Mortel from Riyadh, Saudi Arabia · CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Luton, Southend and Stansted: four more routes

Luton, Southend and Stansted add four new routes between 23 April and 1 July 2027: three from easyJet and one from Cyprus Airways.

easyJet's Southend to Rhodes starts on 27 April, twice weekly on Tuesdays and Saturdays, from £69.98 one way. easyJet calls it a new exclusive route. Luton to Thessaloniki starts on 1 May with one Saturday flight a week, from £54.98.

Luton to Rennes, the capital of Brittany, starts on 1 July and flies twice weekly on Thursdays and Sundays, from £43.48, the cheapest published fare of the new routes. We'd pair it with a day on the Brittany coast.

Cyprus Airways will fly Larnaca to Stansted daily from 23 April 2027. It is the only daily service among the four, and the most useful for a flexible trip because you can choose any weekday.

Jet2 also adds Jersey from Stansted three times a week on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays, according to Travel Weekly (23 Jul 2026). We could not confirm a first-flight date for it, so we left it out of the count. No first-flight date was confirmed for Jet2's other new summer 2027 routes either.

Photo: dronepicr · CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

What we left out, and why

We left out three kinds of change: extra frequencies on existing routes, airports that swap between London sites, and routes that have already launched.

• Expansions, not new routes. British Airways summer 2027 adds flights or seats to Buenos Aires, Rio, San Jose, Cape Town and Las Vegas. Its release lists them as changes to existing services.
• Airport switches. Fuerteventura moves from Gatwick to Heathrow. Skiathos moves from London City to Heathrow, and Perugia moves the other way.
• Already flying. Gatwick to Colombo started on 23 October 2026, with return fares from £524. Virgin Atlantic's Heathrow to Phuket was scheduled to start on 18 October.
• Existing US routes. More flights to Cincinnati and St. Louis are growth on routes BA already flies.

We found no other confirmed new Heathrow routes for summer 2027 beyond Bergen. If an airline announces one after 11 November 2026, this list will be out of date, so check dates against the airline before you pay.

When to book, and why start dates shift

Book in this order: routes already on sale first, then routes with a thin weekly schedule, then anything with no published timetable. Start dates can still move.

Start dates shift for dull reasons. British Airways ends its winter release with a line that the final schedule is subject to scheduling and slot constraints. Outlets also disagree on small details: the Melbourne outbound is 9 January while the first return from Melbourne is 11 January, and several reports blur the two.

And frequency is a quiet risk. A twice-weekly flight that is cancelled costs you days, not hours, so we'd leave a spare day at either end of a trip on any route that flies once or twice a week.

More new flights from other departure cities

If you can leave from somewhere other than London, other airports have their own new routes. We cover new flights from New York in 2027 and new direct flights from Philadelphia to Europe.

For a wider view of where new nonstop routes are opening up, see our roundup of eight new direct routes launching by March 2027.

Frequently Asked Questions

Key Takeaways

Sources

1. British Airways: new Tanzania routes and network update for summer 2027 (17 Sep 2026)
2. British Airways: major winter 2026 expansion (16 Mar 2026)
3. British Airways: expanded winter schedule launch (26 Oct 2026)
4. British Airways: European schedule for summer 2027, including Bergen (10 Nov 2026)
5. British Airways: Cincinnati to London Heathrow schedule (22 Sep 2026)
6. British Airways: St. Louis to London Heathrow schedule (22 Sep 2026)
7. Heathrow: new winter routes from Heathrow
8. TUI Group: new direct flights to Zanzibar for winter 2027
9. easyJet: 18 new routes for summer 2027 (24 Sep 2026)
10. easyJet: additional new routes for summer 2027 (15 Oct 2026)
11. Euronews: Qantas confirms Sydney to London nonstop (18 Jun 2026)
12. Travel Weekly: Jet2 expands Gatwick schedule for summer 2027 (18 Feb 2026)
13. Travel Weekly: Jet2 expands Bournemouth, Stansted and Jersey programmes (23 Jul 2026)
14. Travel Extra: TUI increases airline connections to Spain
15. Cyprus Mail: Cyprus Airways to launch daily flights to London Stansted (21 Oct 2026)
16. AeroRoutes: TUI Airways NS27 London Gatwick network additions (schedule filings, lead only)
17. AeroRoutes: beOnd NW26 network changes (schedule filings, lead only)