If you’re familiar with Sydney international airport (SYD) you know that due to its night curfew it is quite a heavily congested airport. Flights are allowed to take off and land from 6am to 11pm. Therefore opening hours are very busy and slots are not easy to come by. Emirates is one of the airlines that offers the largest number of seats, despite having only 3 slots available. Those seats are going to grow further very soon.
What EK Flights to Sydney Currently Look Like
Just as other airlines worldwide slowing down operations in the wake of 2020, Emirates was not immune to this. The middle eastern aviation giant reduced flights and deployed smaller planes to strategic destinations such as Sydney International Airport (SYD).
However since 2021 luckily things have changed. The world of aviation is now close to regaining pre-2020 passenger traffic levels with airlines resuming all services and deploying their largest planes once again.
Emirates operates 3 daily flights to Sydney:
- EK412
- EK414
- EK416
Of which the first two are served with the largest plane in the fleet, the Airbus A380, while EK416 flies to Sydney on the smaller Boeing 777-300ER.
| Flight | From | To | Departs | Arrives | Aircraft Type | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 | EK412 | Dubai (DXB) | Sydney (SYD) | 10:15 | 07:00+1 | A380-800 |
| EK413 | Sydney (SYD) | Dubai (DXB) | 21:45 | 05:15+1 | A380-800 |
| EK414 | Dubai (DXB) | Sydney (SYD) | 02:00 | 22:30 | A380-800 |
| EK415 | Sydney (SYD) | Dubai (DXB) | 06:00 | 13:20 | A380-800 |
| EK416 | Sydney (SYD) | Dubai (DXB) | 21:30 | 18:20 | A380-800 |
| EK417 | Sydney (SYD) | Dubai (DXB) | 21:10 | 04:30+1 | A380-800 |
Sydney is Once Again an All A380 Emirates Destination
However this status quo is going to change ahead of the Australian summer season. Starting November 4th 2023 all three flights will be once again operated by the Airbus A380.
EK416 and return flight EK417 will switch over to the much larger double decker plane enhancing the capacity on this route by approximately 260 seats on a daily basis. That translates to over 1800 weekly extra seats on the Dubai to Sydney route.
Specifically the A380 configuration chosen is the newest 4 class one offering:
- 14 First Class Suites
- 76 Business Class Flat Bed Seats
- 56 Premium Economy Seats
- 338 Economy Class Seats
This is the newest cabin version that Emirates has to offer and is gradually retrofitting it on a significant number of its A380s and 777s.
Why The Need To Switch Planes?
As mentioned at the beginning of the post, one of the rarest assets to come across at Sydney airport are flight slots. Therefore it is almost impossible to increase services for Emirates from Dubai to the capital of New South Wales. The remaining alternative to increase available seats is to jack up capacity by deploying a larger plane on the route. In Emirates’ case the largest plane is also the largest in the world, the A380.
Emirates Also Returning to Adelaide?
The Dubai based airline is also in talks to re-open one of its pre-2020 Australian routes. Emirates is planning to make a return with a direct flight to Adelaide from Dubai. However for this to happen EK must start freeing up planes to use on the route and this will only happen when the first Airbus A350’s start arriving in summer of 2024. So there is a little longer to wait for this flight to make a comeback in the Emirates destination network.
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