Summary
- Wizz Air has 19 overnight routes between June and September.
- They depart before or after midnight and arrive at 04:00+.
- Wizz Air aims for high aircraft productivity, with 14 hours of flying daily, despite potential punctuality problems.
The Wizz Air Group comprises four airline units: Wizz Air Hungary, Malta, UK, and Abu Dhabi. When combined, they have 215 aircraft. The ultra-low-cost carrier (ULCC) is the fifth-largest airline serving Europe and – because of its size and tiny domestic operation – the world’s fourth-largest international operator.
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Wizz Air’s overnight flights
This article exclusively focuses on two sets of services: those that leave before midnight and arrive at 04:00+1 or later and those that leave after midnight and arrive at 04:00 or later. Doing so necessarily excludes other services.
Most European LCCs/ULCCs do not operate such flights. Distances are relatively short, and two-hour time zone changes are often the maximum. Such overnight flights can impact demand, fares, slots, airport curfews, and crew duty limits, although aircraft utilization might increase.
Photo: Savvapanf Photo | Shutterstock
The article does not refer to the many Wizz Air flights that arrive back at the relevant base between 00:00 and 03:00. Such times help to accommodate longer flights, increase the vitally important aircraft productivity, and enable routine maintenance to be conducted overnight.
The following information is based on analyzing Wizz Air’s departure and arrival times using Cirium schedule data for June to September 2024 and cross-referencing them with the ULCC’s website. Nearly all routes have other times available. The most common times are chosen when a route’s overnight schedule varies.
Photo: Dizfoto | Shutterstock (old livery)
Leave before midnight, arrive at 04:00+
Hardly surprisingly, the routes that leave before midnight and fly for three to four or more hours tend to involve the edges of Europe or further away:
|
Routing |
Departs (local) |
Arrives (local) |
Block time |
|---|---|---|---|
|
London Gatwick-Istanbul |
22:00 |
04:05+1 |
4h 5m |
|
Keflavik-Budapest |
23:00 |
05:25+1 |
4h 25m |
|
Budapest-Baku |
23:05 |
04:50+1 |
3h 45m |
|
Milan Malpensa-Cairo Sphinx |
23:15 |
04:10+1 |
3h 55m |
|
Milan Malpensa-Kutaisi |
23:15 |
05:15+1 |
4h |
|
Milan Malpensa-Yerevan |
23:15 |
05:25+1 |
4h 10m |
|
Malaga-Sofia |
23:25 |
04:05+1 |
3h 40m |
|
Budapest-Yerevan |
23:40 |
05:00+1 |
3h 20m |
|
Keflavik-Warsaw Chopin |
23:45 |
05:45+1 |
4h |
|
Valencia-Bucharest |
23:45 |
04:15+1 |
3h 30m |
|
Alicante-Bucharest |
23:55 |
04:25+1 |
3h 30m |
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Leave after midnight, arrive at 04:00+
This category is somewhat problematic as Wizz Air has a handful of ‘exciting’ flights that fall outside this schedule limit: they depart after midnight but arrive before 04:00. This means they don’t meet our strict criteria and are omitted here.
|
Routing |
Departs (local) |
Arrives (local) |
Block time |
|---|---|---|---|
|
Alicante-Cluj Napoca |
01:00 |
05:10 |
3h 10m |
|
Baku-Abu Dhabi |
01:10 |
04:15 |
3h 5m |
|
Lisbon-Warsaw Chopin |
01:15 |
06:05 |
3h 50m |
|
Cairo Sphinx-Milan Malpensa |
01:40 |
04:45 |
4h 5m |
|
Cairo Sphinx-Rome Fiumicino |
01:50 |
04:20 |
3h 30m |
|
Kutaisi-Milan Malpensa |
02:25 |
04:45 |
4h 20m |
|
Sharm El Sheikh-Budapest |
02:30 (June 6 and 13 only) |
05:25 |
3h 55m |
|
Yerevan-Rome Fiumicino |
02:45 |
05:00 |
4h 15m |
Which of all these flights would you least like to be on? Let us know in the comments section.