Starting April 21, 2026. Air China will restart flights to Delhi from Beijing with thrice a week service and comes within days of China Eastern restarting flights between Kolkata and Kunming. Coupled with the addition of IndiGo’s flights to Shanghai from Kolkata last month, there is a sudden spurt in connectivity between India and China, where connectivity restarted only last October, after being suspended before the lockdown due to COVID.
IndiGo leading the pack
IndiGo now offers services to Guangzhou and Shanghai from Kolkata and to Guangzhou from Delhi, a total of 21 weekly departures each way between India and China. With 7812 weekly seats between the two countries, IndiGo is currently the largest player in the market, shows data shared by Cirium, an aviation analytics company, exclusively for this article.
This is followed by China Eastern, which operates to Kunming from Kolkata and to Shanghai from Delhi. The airline deploys the 737-800 to Kolkata and A330-200 to Delhi. Overall, it has 22 weekly frequencies both ways and offers 4730 seats between the two countries on a weekly basis.
Air India which recently restarted services with four times a week service between Delhi and Shanghai, will increase the frequency to five weekly services, deploying the legacy 787-8 Dreamliner on the route. At 1806 seats per week and 10 return services, the airline is third out of four in terms of capacity between India and China, while Air China will be the last with six weekly service and 1806 seats. Air China is deploying the A330-300 between Beijing and Delhi.
There has been a sea change in the aviation market in India since the time there existed connectivity between the two countries. In January 2020, the last full month of operations before the pandemic led reduction, the Chinese carriers dominated the connectivity, with 42 weekly frequencies amongst them. This included Air China operating four times a week to Mumbai and five times a week to Delhi from Beijing; China Southern Airlines operating twice daily service to Guangzhou from Delhi; China Eastern Airlines operating eight times a week to Kolkata from Kunming and a daily service to Delhi from Shanghai and Shandong Airlines operating four times a week to Delhi from Kunming. Additionally, RwandAir operated three flights a week between Mumbai and Guangzhou.
Far cry from pre-pandemic times
In January 2020, the last full month of operations between India and China pre-pandemic, there were 64 weekly flights (each-way)between the two countries with 15,094 seats each way. IndiGo has not returned to Chengdu, where it operated from Delhi. IndiGo had also announced flights to Chengdu from Mumbai and were due to commence in March 2020, but never began due to the pandemic. China Southern Airlines has not returned to India. China Southern operated double daily services between Delhi and Guangzhou. Shandong Airlines, which operated four times a week to Kunming from Delhi has also not restarted flights to India. While Air China is starting flights to Delhi, its flights to Mumbai are yet to see the light of the day. Rwand Air used to operate to Guangzhou from Mumbai, with rights to carry passengers. It was an extension of its Kigali – Mumbai service. The airline has subsequently cancelled its Mumbai operations and thus does not offer the extended service.
Network Thoughts
As the relations between India and China improved with connectivity starting between the two countries, IndiGo has pounced on the opportunity. The world today is different from what it was pre-pandemic and a large part of that is to be blamed on the supply chain issues with aircraft manufacturers. In current times, with limited expansion, the routes which have high potential are the ones which will see flights with experimentation taking a back seat.
SpiceJet once operated to China (and Hong Kong). Today it is a shadow of what it was once upon a time. Will Akasa Air jump in? A lot depends on how the bilateral rights are distributed and re-distributed. For now, from the Indian side it would be Air India which would want to add more flights to China as and when capacity is available, possibly linking Mumbai to Shanghai before expanding to other points in China.
Schedule for June 2026
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