Wizz Air is introducing a new service from Belgrade and is expected to introduce additional routes and increase frequencies across markets in the former Yugoslavia following the recent expansion of its Skopje base. With the closure of its Abu Dhabi base, the airline has signalled a strategic shift back toward Central and Eastern Europe. In line with this renewed focus, Wizz Air has also unveiled new routes from nearby bases, including Sofia, Sibiu, and Chisinau.
Wizz Air will introduce a new three weekly service between Belgrade and Madrid, on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays, competing directly against Air Serbia on the route. Flights will commence on October 28, with tickets now available for purchase through the airline's website. Further details can be found here.
Wizz is also set to increase frequencies across its Belgrade network this coming winter season. In addition to its recently launched flights to Alicante and Friedrichshafen, which will continue throughout the winter, the airline will significantly boost capacity on several existing routes. Services to Bergamo will increase by four weekly flights, bringing the total to seven, while both Dortmund and Barcelona will be upgraded to daily operations with three additional weekly rotations. Wizz Air will also add two weekly flights to Basel, for a total of seven, and maintain Larnaca at four weekly services with an extra two weekly rotations. Memmingen, Beauvais and Malta will each see one additional weekly flight compared to last winter, operating eight, five, and four times per week, respectively.
The Montenegrin Minister for Transport, Maja Vukićević, and the CEO of operator Airports of Montenegro, Roko Tolić, met with senior Wizz Air management this week to discuss the airline’s potential expansion in the country. “The meeting focused on a range of concrete measures aimed at further enhancing what has already been a successful partnership, with the goal of opening a new chapter in Montenegro’s air connectivity. Discussions centred on increasing the number of destinations served by Wizz Air from Montenegro, which would further strengthen the country’s links with key European markets”, the Ministry said in a statement. Earlier this year, Mr Tolić revealed that discussions were underway to establish a two-aircraft Wizz Air base at Podgorica Airport, planned for early 2026, describing it as “an opportunity not to be missed”.
Wizz Air is on track to reopen its two-aircraft base at Tuzla Airport. While local authorities initially announced the base would reopen in September, the launch is now expected to be slightly delayed. The airline previously won a blitz five-day tender to operate subsidised flights from Tuzla. It is expected to launch operations to Hamburg, Beauvais, Cologne, Malmo, Gothenburg, Berlin, Charleroi, and Hahn. During the upcoming winter season, which runs from October 26 to March 28, Wizz Air will also increase frequencies on select routes, adding one additional weekly flight to both Memmingen and Basel, for a total of seven and four weekly services respectively.
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They are also receiving a lot more aircraft from Airbus now so their fleet situation has improved a lot.
What do you think?
https://www.exyuaviation.com/2025/01/ryanair-says-underdeveloped-belgrade.html
This winter season JU will be in a much better position to respond as they will have a total of 6 E90/95 at their disposal. I think last winter they had 2 or 3.
All in all, good to see Wizz Air fight back in BEG. Now let's see what JU does under the leadership of the experienced CEO Jiri Marek. ;)
Continental Greece and especially ATH could use an alternative airport. There is next to no competition so ATH can get away with horrible infrastructure, overcrowded terminals and high fees.
True dat, if they could they would drive W6 away from BEG too.
I might be wrong but it seems like Wizz Air is overtaking Air Serbia in Milan. Would be interesting to see the number of seats offered by both to MXP/BGY this winter. I wouldn't be surprised if Wizz Air actually takes the lead.
Just look at Vienna and what a mess three based carriers have created. Austrian Airlines seems to be suffering the most. For the time being, BEG should focus on these two growing as fast as they realistically can.
Hopefully (for JU) Wizz will focus elsewhere for growth opportunities with all the extra A321s they are receiving.
Just look at the destinations map of KEF.
There is a huge amount of traffic to and from Iceland!
https://www.flightradar24.com/data/airports/kef/routes
What IS it with that RJK? dorsnt matter how it looks..It has a%decent runway and thousands of tourism beds Kvarner region including islands!?
Then again, if BEG management was more proactive they could have attracted Icelandair to launch BEG. They have an extensive network across the US and Canada and have a strong brand in those markets.
Then again, I wonder if BEG management even knows FI exists given how lethargic they are.
At this point they seem to be consolidating their position in LCA, MXP/BGY, BCN and DTM/DUS. This is where JU needs to be cautious if they want to remain competitive.
That actually sounds great!
I could really use 10 days of just doing that.
Just my2cents
OS is not doing fine, they just reported a €44 million loss.
Please re-read what I wrote in my other post. I said FI's primary role in BEG would be to carry transfers to the US.
Anyway, in the US Icelandair is known as the backpackers' airline as they tend to be the cheapest option to Europe. Since you enjoy trashing Serbia and its purchasing power, then Icelandair might be the right fit after all, no?
And what actually supports the national economy is many airlines competing with each other for passengers.
ATH is a rare European airports of that size which doesn't have an immediate alternative.
First they schedule year-round flights to Alicante. Then they boost Barcelona to daily in winter and now they are starting flights to Madrid. Their winter network to Spain will be impressive with three destinations and 13 weekly flights.
I expect another round of expansion next summer with another destination (Tenerife, Sevilla, Malaga or Ibiza) to be launched.
They are obviously after the holiday market which is becoming increasingly popular as Serbia follows other ex-Communist countries: less gast and more leisure demand.
This is a direct attack on Air Serbia so let's see what their seasoned and supposedly expert CEO will do.
Continental Greece is basically served by two airports: ATH and SKG. If JU was adventurous enough, they could have explored flying to smaller regional airports similar to what BT does up in the north. All of these are in the range of the ATR.
I am sure airports such as Ioannina, Alexandroupolis... would be more than happy to support JU.
Wizz Air coming and doing it !!!
Hahaha, thats so cool blooded.
I also noticed that all of the 4 weekly flights to LCA will be operated by a plane based in Cyprus. That wasn't the case last winter.
It could be that some other destinations will be operated, partially or completely, by a non BEG plane (like LCA and LTN).
Congratulation to Belgrade and Skopje for that wonderful new addition.
Had JU went ahead with their planned frequencies for this summer, Wizz probably wouldn't have jumped into MAD nor would of easyJet attempted CDG-BEG.
Instead of going daily from now on they will have to share their passengers with Wizz.
I hope JU do it already this winter.
Twice a week shouldnt be much of a problem for them.
That ship has sailed..
I wrote many times before what he did wrong so I will not repeat myself. I will just mention a few things:
1. He opened the doors to TK when he embarked on a Turkish expansion. End result? Anadoloujet launched ESB, ADB and SAW while TK boosted IST from 14 to 21. JU on the other hand expanded IST and launched ESB and ADB. What happened in the end? JU was severely beaten in Turkey after which they considerably downsized IST and turned ADB and ESB into a summer seasonal operation. How is this possible especially given the number of Turkish tourists visiting Serbia?!
2. What happened to his MRO and FF plan with TK? He kept on mentioning that and what happened in the end?
3. His deal with QR was promoted as quite a big deal but what was the end result of that? JU did not launch DOH nor did QR expand their operations into BEG. Heck it even went the other direction with QR downgrading BEG. Yes, they did cut left and right in their network but they also boosted certain destinations. If the deal with JU was so good then there would be no reason to downsize BEG. They could have funneled some regional destinations via BEG and JU. Why didn't they?
4. Horrid state of their A330s. This is a chronic issue which seems to have no end. On top of that the IFE is outdated and the overall product is non-competitive especially when compared to their immediate competition.
5. Too many wet-leases in their fleet which shows a fundamental problem with talent retention. Yes, many airlines out there rely on wet-leases but it's a market that is cooling down. Once again JU is not following this trend. For example, out of 6 Embraers in their fleet, only 2 are 'their own.'
6. Constant delays to the frequent flyer and corporate programs.
7. Their cabins are outdated and are not following general aviation trends. Just have a look at the new MAX cabin that is being rolled out by LO. Heck even the perpetually struggling OS managed to roll out a new cabin which features new seats, USB ports etc.
8. Now that I think of it, didn't he also announce a JU app. What became of that?
So on and so forth. If you are on LinkedIn then you will see a large number of articles where he is being interviewed and where he is speaking of advancements made under his leadership. Has JU come a long way since the days of Jat? Yes, it has.
Is JU lagging behind its competition? Absolutely.
Should more have been done to improve overall passenger experience? Absolutely.
Simply put, with the money they are making, their overall business should be closer to the likes of LOT or Aegean, not Uzbekistan Airways.
I also think they are being too cautious with their expansion. They can't survive without volume. They are moving in the right direction but too slow given how aggressive Wizz Air is becoming. Without more transfers they remain exposed to numerous risks brought about by increased competition.
It has to do with much too little competion at Belgrade airport with no reason for JU to do anything at all.
And this is now biting them hard.
I‘m sure they would expand faster if they had more airplanes, bigger budget, more pilots and cabin crews available etc. If there wasn’t a wet lease, they could only dream of growing and expanding.
What they’ve achieved with so little in a relatively small developing Balkan country is outstanding. Give them some extra time, they know what they’re doing, but they just need more time because of many limitations that they have unlike the competitors.
Air Serbia has much too low frequencies on most of their routes and will get punished for it by the competition.
This is just the beginning.
Wizz will soon announce Belgrade-Malaga.
2x a week.
Issue is that since day one, JU struggled with CEO selection. Time came and went but results were missing. This did not happen because they lacked funds or the right environment to reforms themselves, both were there from the start.
Talent retention was and still is one of their main challenges.
Let's also not forget that Serbia is not an EU member state so there is much less red tape to worry about.
Take Aegean as an example. Their odds were much worse than JU's. They were hated by the government owned OA but they managed to fight their way to the top. How? Well by putting the customer first and by knowing what they want and what they need. They achieved this despite operating out of a much more difficult market. Yes, Greece has a lot more demand but it also has a lot more competition.
Another fine example is LOT. They almost went bankrupt in 2007-2008 but have since reformed themselves to become what they are today. They also operated out of a relatively poor and decentralized market (back in the 1990s and early 2000s) and they had to face a lot of fierce competition from Wizz Air and Ryanair. After all, wasn't Wizz Air's first base in Katowice?
Yet despite all the challenges and limited resources both A3 and LO managed to become what they are today. Air Serbia was rebranded 12 years ago. At some point we need to start asking the difficult questions instead of finding excuses.
As for the app, I did not mean the phone one. There was an article on here how they were testing the IFE app which would be used by passengers inflight.
But have it in mind before booking because when it is oficial prices will go down.
The corona crisis was really a bad start into the 2020ies.
That is not the case with MAD where they can actually grow. If both of them end up coexisting on BEG-MAD then it can only mean JU was not making the most of it and that they were not serving the market adequately.
Don't forget that these flights to Spain are not just used by people from and around BEG but rather from the airport's relatively large catchment area. It includes Romanian Banat, eastern Slavonija, parts of Srpska etc.
Both cities are practically neighbours.
That only shows how strong the Spain-Balkans market actually is.
And Bulgarians.
Thats a lot of seats to fill.
Is food good over there >?