Qatar Airways Announces Huge Frequency Upping to Destinations Worldwide

Qatar Airways, since its founding, has been quite the aggressive player on the global aviation stage. The airline has always had and still has ambitious growth goals, and it always aims to reach them. The airline just recently displayed its new business class QSuite product and now is further expanding its frequencies across its network. An enhancement of the airline’s flights that touches 3 continents and 4 destinations.

Qatar Airways Powers Up Flights to London Heathrow, Male, Tokyo Narita and Miami

Yes, that’s right, in just one day and one announcement the Qatari airline has announced it will be strengthening its position in 4 key destinations in its network. That’s the equivalent to a year of news for some smaller carriers.

Homing in on the details of this massive network power up, Qatar Airways is overall adding 20 weekly frequencies to its schedule summing them for all 4 destinations.

Qatar Airways Ups Doha to London Heathrow to 9 Daily Flights

Let’s kick things off with the most important of the 4 destinations, London Heathrow. As for all other Middle Eastern carriers, Heathrow is the single most important destination in their route network. The British capital attracts both local GCC traffic and wider global traffic, particularly from Australia. Simply put for Qatar Airways and its Gulf region peers, there is no such thing as too many flights or seats to London Heathrow. The only limit are the so precious and rare slots.

Qatar Airways is adding a daily flight to the Doha to London Heathrow route bringing the grand total to 56 weekly services starting October 27th 2024. As all other daily services to London QR109 too will also feature the QSuites as it’ll be aboard one of the airlines’ Boeing 777-300ERs.

The new flight will have number QR109 offering a travel option in the morning out of Doha and in the early afternoon out of London:

New Frequencies for Tokyo, Male, and Miami

Along with the major upgrade regarding the Doha to London route, there is also news for three other destinations:

• Tokyo Narita (NRT) – Japan – Goes from 7 to 11 weekly flights starting February 14th 2025
• Male (MLE) – Maldives – Goes from 21 to 28 weekly flights starting December 13th 2024
• Miami (MIA) – United States – Goes from 10 to 12 weekly flights starting December 14th 2024

The four additional Tokyo Narita flights will fly under the number QR808 with flights covering the route every:

• Tuesday
• Wednesday
• Friday
• Sunday

The additional two Miami flights on the other hand will be active every Monday and Wednesday as flight number QR781:

However, it is the additional 7 weekly flights to Male that make the most sense for the timing of their launch. A mid-December addition is clearly an attempt to intercept the lucrative leisure traveller influx to the islands from Europe during the Christmas holidays. Considerable numbers of Europeans make their way to the Maldives and southeast Asia during the winter holidays escaping the cold gloomy weather. That additional daily service from Doha to Male will fly under flight number QR672:

London Heathrow Slot Bought Off Another Carrier

If you wonder how on earth did Qatar Airways find an available slot at London Heathrow, well answer seems simpler than one might imagine. It seems the middle eastern carrier snatched the slot at the busy London airport by buying it off another carrier. There aren’t official statements, however, it seems that was a Tarom (Romania’s flag carrier) slot that was sold to Qatar Airways. Obviously, no idea either how much it might have cost Qatar Airways to buy it off the Romanian airline.