Qatar Airways has confirmed that it is reactivating four more A380s, according to an interview between the carrier's Chief Commercial Officer and Executive Traveller. The Gulf carrier will now use eight of the double-deckers, up from the current four.

Last year, Qatar Airways' CEO said that the A380 was its biggest mistake, although it might have been partly driven by its spat with Airbus. Despite this, reactivating the type is seemingly another consequence of the ongoing problems with its A350s. It also contributed to the A380 reintroduced last year, B777-300ERs acquired from Cathay Pacific, and A330-300s wet-leased from Oman Air.

Sydney is coming back

After a 26-month absence, the 7,687 miles (12,371km) between Doha and Sydney will again see the iconic A380. Qatar Airways first used the double-decker on the route in September 2016, and it remained until March 2020.

Now it's back, with its relaunch on June 1st from Doha and June 2nd to Doha. It will land in Australia six weeks after the nation scraps pre-departure testing for international tourists, another way of boosting confidence and demand.

The schedule for the 1x daily service is as follows, with all times local. It follows Emirates reinstating 2x daily A380s to Sydney on March 1st.

  • Doha to Sydney: QR908, 20:15-17:10+1
  • Sydney to Doha: QR909, 22:00-04:55+1
Qatar's A380 network pre-pandemic
All of these routes were operated by the A380 pre-pandemic. 

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Uses four A380s but will have eight

Qatar Airways presently uses four A380s, as shown below. As you'd expect, they're the younger aircraft. They're deployed from Doha to London Heathrow and Paris CDG, both reintroduced in November last year.

This summer, they'll be 2x daily A380 flights to Heathrow and 1x daily to CDG, which requires three aircraft. The fourth is a spare and used during maintenance. The relaunch of Sydney will require two additional aircraft, bringing to five how many are needed, or six with the extra machine.

  1. A7-APA: 8.55 years; stored; last flown April 2020
  2. A7-APB: 8.38 years; stored; last flown April 2020
  3. A7-APC: 8.12 years; stored; last flown April 2020
  4. A7-APD: 7.87 (!) years; stored; last flown April 2020
  5. A7-APE: 7.18 years; maintenance; last flown February 2022
  6. A7-APF: 6.92 years; stored; last flown February 2022
  7. A7-APG: 5.80 years; active; last flown on March 25th, 2022
  8. A7-APH: 5.30 years; active; last flown on March 25th, 2022
  9. A7-API: 4.66 years; active; last flown on March 21st, 2022
  10. A7-APG: 4.29 years; active; last flown on March 25th, 2022
Airborne Qatar A380s when writing
When writing, these two A380s are airborne. Highlighted is QR3 to Heathrow, followed by QR18 to CDG. Image: Flightradar24.

Where else might Qatar use the A380?

Qatar Airways has ruled out using the A380 to North America and Singapore, which is predictable as the type wasn't used there pre-pandemic.

The carrier is likely to operate it to where it was before, just as it did to Heathrow, CDG, and Sydney. However, the airline applied to the slot coordinator to use the A380 to Manchester this summer, although it then decided to increase frequency using B787-8s instead.

At various times, Bangkok, Frankfurt, Guangzhou, Melbourne, and Perth all saw Qatar's A380s. Given the significant problems of the pandemic in China, Guangzhou is highly unlikely.

Assuming one continued spare aircraft, Bangkok – helped by scrapping the PCR requirement – is very likely. Frankfurt could be added too. If Melbourne is to materialize, perhaps influenced by Emirates flying two A380s daily to Melbourne from May, it'll need two dedicated aircraft for the route.

Where would you like Qatar to use the double-decker? Let us know in the comments.