After falling into voluntary administration in 2020, Virgin Australia gave up all its wide-body Boeing 777 and Airbus A330 planes and ceased long-haul flying. Its mainline fleet now consists entirely of Boeing 737s, which are designed for domestic and short-haul international flying.
This was a sad end to Virgin Australia’s long-haul operations. But, with the exception of Los Angeles, Virgin never really had much success with long-haul flying anyway.
Virgin Australia has made many changes to its long-haul network since launching V Australia Airlines in 2009. Destinations that didn’t work out include Abu Dhabi, Phuket, Johannesburg, Hong Kong and Tokyo.
As Virgin now prepares to dip its toes back into long-haul flying, with services to Doha launching in June 2025, let’s take a brief look back at the history of Virgin Australia’s long-haul network up until this point…
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V Australia launches in 2009
In 2009, when the airline was still known as Virgin Blue, it began operating long-haul services under the “V Australia Airlines” brand using Boeing 777-300ER aircraft.
V Australia launched in February 2009 with 3x weekly Sydney-Los Angeles flights. It soon added flights from Brisbane and Melbourne to Los Angeles as well.
Those flights continued right up until the COVID-19 pandemic (although Melbourne-Los Angeles was axed in 2014 and returned in 2017). But the airline’s later routes to Phuket and Johannesburg were short-lived.
V Australia was absorbed into Virgin Australia (along with Virgin’s “Pacific Blue” brand, which operated international short-haul services) in December 2011. This was part of John Borghetti’s “Game Change” program, which took Virgin Blue from a budget airline to the full-service Virgin Australia.
In the 2010s, Virgin also flew to Abu Dhabi for a while as part of its partnership with Etihad Airways. That partnership will formally end in June 2025, but Virgin hasn’t actually flown to Abu Dhabi since 2017.
Los Angeles was a successful destination for Virgin Australia
Virgin Australia’s flights to Los Angeles did reasonably well. Virgin operated them as part of a joint venture agreement with Delta, and at the time, Virgin arguably had the best Business Class product flying between Australia and North America.
On its Boeing 777s, Virgin even had a small on-board bar for passengers flying in “the business”. (These aircraft now fly for Qatar Airways with exactly the same seats.)
But after entering voluntary administration in 2020, Virgin no longer had the aircraft – nor the ambition – to fly to the USA. Given the circumstances, Delta and Virgin Australia ended their previously successful trans-Pacific joint venture.
Virgin now partners with United Airlines, but its flights to the USA are limited to codeshares operated by United.
Virgin’s forays into Hong Kong and Japan
Even before the international borders closed due to COVID-19, Virgin had already decided to permanently axe all flights to Hong Kong. In less than three years, Virgin Australia had lost a total of $130 million flying to Hong Kong. The last flight was in March 2020.
Virgin had planned to launch flights from Brisbane to Tokyo a few weeks later, at the end of March 2020, after winning a slot at Haneda Airport in a fierce contest with Qantas. It would have operated daily A330 flights on this route and had even started selling tickets.
But Australia’s borders closed right before Virgin had planned to launch the route. Virgin pushed back the launch indefinitely.
Due to the pandemic, Virgin was able to hang onto its Haneda Airport slot for several more years without actually operating any flights. But in June 2023, it finally had to use or lose its slot. The airline didn’t want to give it up, so it made the dubious decision to launch Cairns-Tokyo flights using Boeing 737s – its only aircraft that could possibly make the trip.
The Boeing 737 flights to Tokyo were not a success. They were operationally challenging, since they were really pushing the range of the Boeing 737, and many flights were reportedly half-full. The short-haul configured aircraft without lie-flat Business seats was hardly a winner with passengers, either.
Finally, last month, Virgin conceded defeat and axed its Cairns-Tokyo flights. In the end, Virgin still had to give up its valuable Haneda Airport slot, which will ultimately go to Qantas. It also lost quite a lot of money in the process.
Virgin still flies to Bali
Virgin Australia internally classifies its Bali services as international short-haul. But as some of these flights are over six hours, they’re worth mentioning here.
Before the COVID-19 pandemic, Virgin operated three routes to Bali using Boeing 737-800s:
- Sydney-Denpasar
- Brisbane-Denpasar
- Port Hedland-Denpasar
Melbourne-Denpasar flights were due to restart in late March 2020.
Virgin still flies to Bali, and has since added those Melbourne-Denpasar as well as Gold Coast-Denpasar flights. But it no longer serves the Port Hedland-Denpasar route. Meanwhile, in recent years it has both launched and axed flights from Adelaide to Bali.
When they relaunched in June 2022 after COVID, Virgin Australia’s flights to Bali sold extremely well.
Virgin’s new flights to Doha
Virgin Australia will resume proper long-haul flying in June 2025 with daily Boeing 777-300ER flights from Sydney, Brisbane and Perth to Doha. Well, sort of…
Although Virgin Australia is marketing these flights, which will operate with “VA” flight numbers, the planes will be wet leased from Qatar Airways. In fact, the pilots and cabin crew will be Qatar Airways employees. These are basically Virgin Australia flights in name only.
There is every chance that these flights will be successful and that Virgin Australia will make money on them. The services are designed for easy connections through Doha onto Qatar Airways’ extensive Middle Eastern, African and European network, and there is plenty of demand.
But the real reason that these flights even exist at all is that the Australian government has blocked Qatar Airways from adding more flights to Australia under its own steam. Qatar Airways, which has also just bought a 25% stake in Virgin Australia, is effectively exploiting a loophole that allows it to operate extra flights as “Virgin Australia” services.
In its submission to the Australian authorities that needed to approve this arrangement, Virgin argued that these flights will allow it to test the waters and consider restarting its own long-haul flights within 3-5 years. It remains to be seen whether Virgin was just paying lip service to the government, or if they’re serious about acquiring long-haul planes again.
A complete list of Virgin Australia long-haul routes
To sum up, here’s a complete history of all changes to Virgin Australia’s long-haul and Southeast Asian network until now:
- February 2025: Cairns-Tokyo cancelled
- April 2024: Adelaide-Denpasar suspended
- June 2023: Cairns-Tokyo launched
- March 2023: Gold Coast-Denpasar launched
- December 2022: Adelaide-Denpasar relaunched
- June 2022: Flights from Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane to Denpasar resume
- Late March 2020: Sydney-Los Angeles, Brisbane-Los Angeles, Melbourne-Los Angeles suspended; planned launches of Brisbane-Tokyo & Melbourne-Denpasar cancelled
- Early March 2020: Sydney-Hong Kong cancelled
- Feb 2020 – Melbourne-Hong Kong cancelled
- April 2019 – Seasonal Darwin-Denpasar route operates for six months and does not return
- July 2018 – Sydney-Hong Kong launched
- July 2017 – Melbourne-Hong Kong launched
- June 2017 – Perth-Abu Dhabi flights were supposed to launch, but the route was axed before the first flight departed (Etihad also withdrew from the Perth-Abu Dhabi route in October 2018)
- April 2017 – Melbourne-Los Angeles reinstated
- February 2017 – Sydney-Abu Dhabi cancelled
- January 2017 – Tigerair gets banned from operating to Indonesia and permanently axes all flights to Denpasar the following month
- March 2016 – Perth-Denpasar, Adelaide-Denpasar and Melbourne-Denpasar cancelled with routes given to Tigerair
- January 2016 – Perth-Phuket cancelled
- April 2015 – Port Hedland-Denpasar launched
- October 2014 – Melbourne-Los Angeles cancelled
- December 2013 – Sydney-Denpasar and Melbourne-Denpasar launched
- February 2011 – Sydney-Abu Dhabi launched (V Australia); Melbourne-Johannesburg, Melbourne-Phuket and Brisbane-Phuket cancelled
- March 2010 – Melbourne-Johannesburg launched (V Australia)
- December 2009 – Melbourne-Phuket launched (V Australia)
- November 2009 – Brisbane-Phuket (V Australia) and Perth-Phuket (Pacific Blue) launched
- September 2009 – Melbourne-Los Angeles launched (V Australia)
- April 2009 – Brisbane-Los Angeles launched (V Australia)
- February 2009 – Sydney-Los Angeles launched (under V Australia brand)
- December 2008 – Adelaide-Denpasar, Brisbane-Denpasar and Perth-Denpasar launched (under Pacific Blue brand)
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