Emirates has announced it will commence daily flights from Auckland to Bali from 14 June 2018. The surprise announcement comes as Emirates withdraws from the Melbourne-Auckland and Brisbane-Auckland routes next month.
Qantas also recently announced a new route from Melbourne to Bali. Qantas will start daily Melbourne-Denpasar flights from 23 June 2018 using Boeing 737s.
The new Emirates Auckland-Bali service will continue to/from Dubai. As well as passengers travelling between Auckland and Dubai, Emirates will carry passengers just travelling between Dubai-Bali and Auckland-Bali using its fifth-freedom traffic rights.
Bali is a hugely popular holiday destination, with more than a million Australians visiting every year. This demand has been matched by the airlines which have saturated the Australia to Bali market with capacity. This capacity will only increase as Qantas adds its second daily flight to Denpasar and Malindo Air also considers a new Melbourne-Bali service.
But the New Zealand-Bali market is currently underserved. Air New Zealand is currently the only airline flying from New Zealand to anywhere in Indonesia, with a seasonal 5x weekly Auckland-Bali service. Emirates has apparently seen an opening in the market, but time will tell if the new route will be successful. A daily Boeing 777-300ER service with 354 seats across Economy, Business and First class may be excessive. There are still plenty of one-stop options between New Zealand and Bali via Australia.
I guess they are trying, but I don’t think reality will be plane loads wanting to travel direct. Some of course but not enough.
The good news for New Zealanders is that prices will likely be extremely competitive. It also appears that Emirates is releasing plenty of award availability on the new route. You can redeem Qantas Frequent Flyer points or Emirates Skywards miles to fly Economy, Business or First class from Auckland to Bali.
Wiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiide open in all classes. 🙂 Every day.
Emirates already operates a daily non-stop Auckland-Dubai service using the Airbus A380.
Join the discussion on the Australian Frequent Flyer forum: Emirates will fly DXB-DPS-AKL daily
