United, American, and Air Canada are among North American airlines with big plans for the XLR next year.
Global airlines have big plans for the Airbus A321XLR.
The airframer has delivered 47 of the A320-family variant since it launched in late 2024, and over 400 more are on order as Airbus scales production.
American Airlines, Iberia, Aer Lingus and Qantas have the biggest fleets so far and are using the extra fuel capacity to connect smaller cities that would not usually be profitable on the current widebody long-haul fleet. It has led to some interesting routes: New York JFK to Edinburgh, Scotland; Madrid to Boston; and Dublin to Nashville, Tennessee, to name a few. Plus, connections between the US East and West Coast and some domestic Australian routes.
By summer 2027, airlines plan to deploy the long-range narrowbodies on routes connecting even more far-flung places more efficiently. In August, two major US carriers announced a number of new routes using the XLR for next year.
- Newark-Luxembourg (from April 2027)
Washington Dulles-Toulouse (from April 2027)
Newark-Ibiza (from May 2027)
Newark-Valencia (from June 2027)
Newark-Marseille (from June 2027)
- JFK-Amsterdam (daily, from March 2027)
- JFK-Nice (daily, from May 2027)
- Philadelphia-Porto (from March 2027)
Philadelphia-Vienna (from May 2027)
- Toronto–Shannon (from June 2027)
- Toronto–Oslo (from June 2027)
- Toronto–London Heathrow, fifth daily (from May 2027)
United and American in particular are hoping to use the XLR to replace ageing and inefficient Boeing 757 aircraft.
Other carriers operating the new variant include Saudia, IndiGo and Wizz Air, though the latter has scaled back its order for the type and moved away from using it to specifically open longer routes.
Which airlines will get the XLR next?
Airbus has been tight-lipped about production rates on the delayed deliveries, with executives saying annual or semi-annual rates are more meaningful as numbers remain choppy. It is currently targeting 70-75 A320-family aircraft per month by the end of 2027, with no specifics for which of those may be XLRs.
Data from Cirium shows 110 XLR orders with tentative delivery dates in 2027. Top buyers include American (19), IndiGo (19), United (15), Saudia (eight) and Qantas (eight). Pushing beyond 2027 and into the 2030s, buyers include JetBlue, Cebu Pacific, Air Arabia, AirAsia and Icelandair.
New routes announced as even more XLRs enter service could see flights stretch even longer than its current record, Iberia’s Madrid-Santo Domingo route, which comes in at roughly 3,600nm (6,667km).
The aircraft’s true operational limits remain to be seen. Flights so far have only used less than 80% of the XLR’s published range of 4,700nm.
“I feel like we’re very conservative with the range of the aircraft,” United’s head of network planning, Patrick Quayle, told reporters in late August.
“You know, originally when Airbus marketed it, it was a lot further than what it is right now, as constructed and as built. And so all the places that we’re looking at … we feel very comfortable with the range of the aircraft.”
A version of this story originally appeared in FlightGlobal’s Airlines newsletter. Sign up here to receive it directly in your inbox weekly.
The post Tracking airlines’ new routes as long-haul A321XLR plans take shape first appeared on FlightGlobal.