Singapore Airlines announces schedule through to December 2021

Singapore Airlines has announced its flight schedules through to the end of December 2021, adding two additional months to the previously confirmed route list, which was published through to 31st October 2021.

The network remains steady at 53 cities, with some frequency and aircraft type adjustments since the last update.

The passenger network over the next four months continues to be served by the following aircraft types:

• Airbus A350-900s
• Boeing 737-800s
• Boeing 777-300ERs
• Boeing 787-10s

There are still no firm plans announced by the airline to bring any Airbus A380s back into service, with the superjumbo removed from the schedules until at least January 2022.

Fifth freedom routes extended

In the past few months Singapore Airlines has launched two new fifth freedom routes, one between Copenhagen and Rome and the other between Taipei and Los Angeles, as it capitalises on pockets of passenger and cargo demand outside its home base.

These services were originally loaded in the schedule until the end of October 2021, but both have been extended until at least 31st December 2021, with this latest update.

Non-stop flights from Singapore to Rome have therefore been provisionally pushed back until 2nd January 2022.

Phuket gets A350s

Singapore Airlines seems to be predicting some good transit traffic volumes to and from Phuket over the Christmas and New Year period, with one of its two daily flights being upgauged to the Airbus A350 between 17th December 2021 and 11th January 2022.

Between 17th December 2021 and the end of the year the morning SQ728/727 flight will be flown by a three-class Airbus A350 Long Haul, then in January wide-body service switches to the evening SQ738/735 flight using an Airbus A350 Regional.

These flights will operate alongside the usual Boeing 737-800 services, and will mean passengers can experience the latest flat-bed Business Class seats on this short route.

Singapore Airlines has flown flat-bed Business Class seat to Phuket before, using Boeing 777-200ERs on the route in late 2019 and early 2020, just before the COVID-19 pandemic.

Headline figures

In total Singapore Airlines will fly over 3,500 passenger flights per month by November 2021, its highest total since schedules were slashed in April 2020.

That compares to around 7,800 passenger flights in November 2019, the most representative pre-COVID measure for this period, meaning SIA will have restored 45% of its passenger capacity by flight volumes this summer, however this drops to 31% if you also consider the pre-COVID SilkAir schedule.

Here are the top five short-haul and long-haul routes on the network during the last two months of the year.

Top Routes
(November – December 2021)

Short-haul & Asia

• Jakarta: 24/wk
• Manila: 21/wk
• Kuala Lumpur: 18/wk
• Phuket: 14/wk
• Bangkok: 14/wk

Australia & Long-haul

• London: 18/wk
• Sydney: 17/wk
• Brisbane: 14/wk
• Melbourne: 14/wk
• Perth: 14/wk

These ten cities alone represent over 40% of all planned Singapore Airlines passenger services by flight frequency during this period (pre-COVID, they accounted for about 30%).

There are also an additional 19 routes served between 7-13 times a week (i.e. at least daily), as outlined in the tables below.

Singapore Airlines schedule

There are no new routes in the latest schedule update, with the most recent addition being the Taipei – Los Angeles services.

Jakarta has already seen an increase to 24 flights per week, the most frequently served city on the network, while Hong Kong gets a second daily service from November.

Munich has already seen an increase from 3 flights per week to 5, with the addition of two Vaccinated Travel Lane services (SQ331/332) twice per week, in addition to the regular flights.

Here’s a map of the Asia-Pacific destinations Singapore Airlines will be serving between September and December 2021.

In addition, three US destinations, 13 European cities, Dubai in the Middle East and both Cape Town and Johannesburg in South Africa will be served.

Singapore Airlines will be running the following passenger route network between September 2021 and December 2021.

All routes not listed below are cancelled during this period, or will have cargo-only operation.

Singapore Airlines Routes Short-haul & Asia (Sep – Dec 2021)
City	Month(s)			Acft
	Sep	Oct	Nov – Dec
Bangkok	14/wk	14/wk	14/wk	359 359R
Brunei	4/wk (was 3/wk)	3/wk	3/wk	738
Chongqing	1/wk	1/wk	1/wk	787
Colombo	5/wk	5/wk	5/wk	359R
Denpasar	—	—	7/wk	787
Dhaka	3/wk (was 7/wk)	7/wk	7/wk	359R
Fukuoka	2/wk	2/wk	2/wk	787
Hanoi*	10/wk	10/wk	10/wk	359R
Ho Chi Minh*	10/wk	10/wk	10/wk	359 359R 77W
Hong Kong	7/wk	7/wk	14/wk	359 77W
Jakarta	24/wk (was 21/wk)	24/wk	24/wk	359 77W
Kathmandu**	1/wk (was 4/wk)	4/wk	4/wk	738 787
Kuala Lumpur	18/wk	18/wk	18/wk	359 738
Malé	7/wk	7/wk	7/wk	738
Manila	21/wk	21/wk	21/wk	359R
Medan	2/wk	2/wk	2/wk	738
Nagoya	3/wk	3/wk	3/wk	787
Osaka	7/wk	7/wk	7/wk	359R
Phnom Penh	9/wk	9/wk	9/wk	738
Phuket	14/wk	14/wk	14/wk	359 738
Seoul	6/wk (was 7/wk)	6/wk (was 7/wk)	7/wk	787
Shanghai	1/wk	1/wk	1/wk	787
Shenzhen	1/wk	1/wk	1/wk	359R
Taipei	7/wk	7/wk	7/wk	359 787
Tokyo Haneda	3/wk	3/wk	3/wk	359R
Tokyo Narita	11/wk	11/wk	11/wk	359R 77W 787
Yangon*	2/wk	2/wk	2/wk	359R
Total	193/wk	199/wk	214/wk

* Cargo-only from Singapore, pax and cargo back to Singapore
** Pax and cargo from Singapore, cargo-only back to Singapore
The latest updated schedules including days of operation is available at this dedicated page on the Singapore Airlines website.

The Bali restart, originally planned for May 2021, has been pushed back to November 2021. The island’s plan to open a ‘Green Zone’ for international tourists is currently on hold.

Bali has about 6 new COVID-19 cases per day per 100,000 population at the time of writing, about half that of Germany, but the full vaccination rate lags behind at 49%, so it could still be some time before a ‘sandbox-style’ scheme gets underway there.

Once that does happen though, you can be sure SIA will be flying to Denpasar again, if only to tap into transit traffic from Europe and the US initially.

Twice weekly Boeing 787-10 service is pencilled in for now.

Singapore Airlines Routes Australia & Long-haul (Sep – Dec 2021)
City	Month		Acft
	Sep	Oct – Dec
Adelaide	3/wk	3/wk	359R
Amsterdam	7/wk	7/wk	359
Auckland	10/wk	10/wk	359
Barcelona (via MXP)	3/wk	3/wk	359
Brisbane	14/wk	14/wk	359R
Cape Town (via JNB)	2/wk	2/wk	359
Christchurch	4/wk	4/wk	359
Copenhagen	3/wk	3/wk	359
Dubai	5/wk	5/wk	359R
Frankfurt	10/wk	10/wk	359 77W
Istanbul	2/wk	2/wk	359
Johannesburg	5/wk	5/wk	359
London	18/wk	18/wk	359 77W
Los Angeles^ (incl. via NRT/TPE)	13/wk (was 10/wk)	13/wk	359 77W
Manchester	3/wk	3/wk	359
Melbourne	14/wk	14/wk	359R
Milan	3/wk	3/wk	359
Moscow	3/wk	3/wk	359
Munich	5/wk (was 3/wk)	5/wk	359
New York JFK	7/wk	7/wk	359ULR
Paris	7/wk	7/wk	359
Perth	14/wk	14/wk	787
Rome (via CPH)	3/wk	3/wk	359
San Francisco	7/wk	7/wk	359ULR
Sydney	17/wk	17/wk	359R 77W 787
Zurich	7/wk	7/wk	359
Total	189/wk	189/wk

^ Passengers cannot travel from Singapore to Los Angeles via Taipei due to transit restrictions. TPE-LAX traffic only on this route.
The latest updated schedules including days of operation is available at this dedicated page on the Singapore Airlines website.

London remains the busiest long-haul route, with 18 weekly services, including a First Class option on Boeing 777-300ERs once per day.

Speaking of First Class on the Boeing 777s, this cabin continues to be available as follows during the September to December 2021 period, including its most recent introduction on Frankfurt – Singapore VTL flights:

• Frankfurt (SQ326/325)
• Hong Kong (SQ882/883)
• Jakarta (SQ950/951/953/964/965/968)
• London (SQ322/317)
• Los Angeles (SQ12/11)
• Sydney (SQ231/222)
• Tokyo (SQ12/11*)

* Sunday SQ12/11 Tokyo services are operated by A350 Regional aircraft, with no First Class cabin.

You can learn more about the Singapore – Germany Vaccinated Travel Lane at our comprehensive guide here.

What about SilkAir?

SilkAir’s passenger operations came to an end in May 2021, with the airline now only operating empty test flights and all passenger routes transferred to Singapore Airlines.

Don’t miss our tribute to the ‘Regional Wing’, including many details of its long history, some of which may surprise you.

Which routes are left?

With 53 destinations across the Singapore Airlines and former SilkAir network now reinstated, it’s interesting to consider which cities or airports are still to be added to the list (or not, as the case may be).

Here’s the latest rundown.

	City / Airport
Pending reinstatement (SIA route)	Ahmedabad Beijing Bengaluru Busan Chennai Delhi Guangzhou Houston Kolkata Mumbai Newark Sapporo (seasonal) Seattle Surabaya
Pending reinstatement (former SilkAir route)	Bandung Cairns Chengdu Da Nang Darwin Hyderabad Kochi Siem Reap Xiamen
Transferred to Scoot (and still pending reinstatement)	Balikpapan Lombok Makassar Semarang Yogyakarta
Discontinued since COVID-19 (no planned reinstatement)	Brussels Canberra Dusseldorf Hiroshima Koh Samui Stockholm Wellington

Singapore Airlines is maintaining more or less the status quo with its route network through to the end of 2021, though as we’ve seen recently with approvals like the Germany VTL scheme, short-notice additions can always be made when demand is there.

For the time being no Airbus A380 operations are planned in 2021, though again if the circumstances warrant it, plans can always be changed.

Meanwhile the airline is extending operation on its latest pair of fifth freedom routes and upgauging Phuket flights over the festive season to wide-body Airbus A350s.

Stay tuned for more inevitable schedule developments before the end of the year.

(Cover Photo: AirImages / Shutterstock)