ITA Airways Strengthens Winter Schedule but Long-Haul Remains Its Biggest Challenge

Long gone are the days of blatant inefficiency at the Italian flag carrier. Gone are the days and ways of Alitalia, ITA Airways is showing much different performance with sustained growth as it inches closer to profitability. However, not everything is still where it should be there are still issues to be resolved. Allow me to walk you through my take of the current situation.

Expanding the Network for Winter 2025–26

The Italian flag carrier has sent out a press release that shared some interesting information and insights. The main topic was the winter schedule the airline will be operating across the upcoming 6 months. It then went on to reveal some passengers figures, which I’ll delve deeper into later in this post.

During the upcoming winter season ITA Airways will be operating a 53 destination route network from its two bases, Rome Fiumicino (Long Range) and Milan Linate (Short and Medium Range). Among those 53 destinations the latest addition to the long haul network.

Mauritius: A New Long-Haul Destination from Rome

Mauritius, albeit as a seasonal service, will join the ITA Airways route network with a direct non-stop flight from Rome Fiumicino. The new service is part of the airline’s long haul expansions which in this case, as for the new Bangkok flight, aims to intercept leisure demand during winter months.

Mauritius, specifically around the Christmas holidays, is one of the most requested destinations by Italian holiday makers. However, prior to the new ITA Airways flight, there weren’t any non-stop services. The main options for Italians were a one stop journey via the middle east (on Emirates, Qatar Airways or Etihad).

Having a direct flight option is particularly appealing as it is much more convenient and cuts down travel time significantly. ITA’s new Mauritius flight takes off on November 7th.

Seasonal Growth on Existing Long-Haul Routes

In addition to launching the new Rome to Mauritius ITA Airways is further strengthening other two existing long haul services. More frequencies will be added on flights to:

• Buenos Aires – Jumping up to 9 weekly flights from the current 7 from December 16th 2025 to January 6th 2026).
• Bangkok – Becoming a daily flight starting December 8th 2025.

Furthermore, ITA Airways is also bringing back for the 2025-2026 winter season its Male (Maldives) flight from December 19th.

Passenger Numbers Show Strong Growth – but Limited Long-Haul Share

However there is more to touch on that came out of this press release. That is the passenger figures.

So far, in the first 9 months of 2025, ITA Airways has welcomed aboard an impressive 12.6 million passengers. Considering there are still 3 months to account for, the 15 million passenger mark is not at all out of reach.

However the airline also let us know that out of those 12.6 million passengers only 2 million traveled on long haul flights. And that is the biggest issue the Italian carrier has to address to unlock more growth and new levels of profitability.

Long haul is where airlines make the largest profit. On European flights were LCCs dominate the scene margins are razor thin. It is great to see ITA expanding on leisure destinations Italians want to go to, however, the need to intercept incoming (to Italy) tourists and more business travelers is concrete.

That means expanding its route network and flights to the United States and east Asia. That leads to another issue, the airline’s fleet. There are still too few long-range capable aircraft in it, with still the Alitalia configured A330-200s flying around. More A330neo will have to arrive before more growth can be achieved.

The Path Forward: A Need for Stronger Intercontinental Reach

Part of the push in this direction is coming from ITA Airways’ new ownership, Lufthansa.

Lufthansa, along with its Star Alliance US partner United, is pushing hard to get ITA Airways into the A++ transatlantic joint venture as fast as possible. Only then, the German airline recons, will sustained growth be unlocked and constant profitability achieved.