WestJet Is Cancelling Most Of Its Summer Service To Europe & Here Are Your Other Options
There are still plenty of flights to Europe from the Toronto area.
A WestJet plane departing from Vancouver International Airport. Right: A PLAY Airlines flight in the sky.
WestJet has recently announced they would be taking a major step back when it comes to summer flights to Europe, suspending service to the continent from Halifax, Toronto, and Vancouver.
The decision from Canada's second-largest airline was made due to "capacity constraints," and now leaves Europe-bound travellers with fewer options, but there are still plenty of overseas flights to go around.
Previously, Westjet's service to Europe offered direct flights from Toronto Pearson International Airport (YYZ) overseas as well as several flights that connected through Halifax Stanfield International Airport (YHZ).
Luckily, a combination of well-established carriers and some new airlines in Canada still give you a wide variety of options for your next trip across the pond.
Here's a list of some of the other airlines you can fly with to Europe during the summer of 2023.
Air Canada
Canada's largest airline continues to offer a wide variety of flights to Europe and also just recently expanded some of its overseas services.
In October 2022, Air Canada announced three new overseas destinations. Toronto to Brussels, Montreal to Toulouse, and Montreal to Copenhagen. All three will operate five flights per week.
The rest of AC's robust summer 2023 schedule to Europe includes flights out of Toronto to London Heathrow, Edinburgh, Copenhagen, Barcelona, and Madrid. Additional flights from Montreal go to Frankfurt, Geneva, and Nice.
PLAY Airlines
This is one of the newer airlines to enter the Canadian travel industry, offering much cheaper flights.
The low-cost airline based out of Iceland announced the expansion of its service into Canada in January, with the launch taking place on June 22, 2023. However, instead of flying out of Toronto Pearson, PLAY is flying from John C. Munro Hamilton International Airport.
PLAY Airlines will fly to 26 Europe destinations from Hamilton and its "no-frills service" comes with round-trip fares ranging between $500 and $800, depending on where you fly.
Air Transat
As Canada's third-largest airline, Air Transat will be picking up much of the service to Europe that WestJet has suspended.
In its previously announced summer 2023 program, Air Transat said during the peak of the season it will offer 73 direct flights a week from Toronto to 15 cities in Europe.
Those cities include Amsterdam, Athens, Barcelona, Dublin, Glasgow, Lisbon, London, Paris, and Rome.
As for WestJet, the airline will continue to fly to Europe for its main base in Calgary, while it said it will "evaluate the return of transatlantic service in 2024."
Before you get going, check out our Responsible Travel Guide so you can be informed, be safe, be smart, and most of all, be respectful on your adventure.
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