Emirates Returning to Adelaide

Emirates will resume daily flights between Dubai and Adelaide in October 2024, marking the airline’s return to its fifth pre-COVID Australian destination.

From 28 October 2024, Emirates will operate a Boeing 777-200LR on the Adelaide-Dubai route with the following schedule:

• EK441 Adelaide 22:35 – Dubai 05:15 (+1 day)
• EK440 Dubai 02:00 – Adelaide 20:50

The Boeing 777-200LR is the smallest aircraft type in Emirates’ current fleet. It’s configured with 38 Business Class and 264 Economy seats, as well as significant freight capacity. There is no First Class or Premium Economy on this aircraft type.

Business Class on the Emirates Boeing 777-200LR is laid out in a 2-2-2 configuration, with fully lie-flat seats.

Economy Class has a 3-4-3 layout.

At the time of writing, Emirates has not yet released Classic Reward availability on this new route. Once seats become available, you’ll be able to redeem Emirates Skywards miles or Qantas Frequent Flyer points for a seat. You could also use Air Canada Aeroplan points to avoid paying Emirates’ reward flight carrier charges.

Emirates back to pre-COVID capacity into Australia

Once Emirates also resumes its second daily Perth-Dubai flight in December, it will be back to flying as much capacity into Australia as it did before the COVID-19 pandemic.

Emirates continued serving Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Perth during most of the pandemic, but scrapped its Adelaide service in early 2020. Emirates originally began flying to Adelaide in 2012, and in 2019 it carried over 165,000 passengers between the two cities.

“The return of Emirates to Adelaide has been highly anticipated by passengers and industry for some time,” Emirates Divisional Vice President Australasia Barry Brown said.

“The return of our Adelaide service completes our current footprint in Australia serving five points across the country. With special thanks to our partners at the South Australian Tourism Commission and Adelaide Airport, we could not be prouder to be fulfilling Emirates’ commitment to Australia.”

South Australian Premier Peter Malinauskas said that the Emirates service to Adelaide had been “very much missed by South Australians”.

“Reinstating Emirates flights to Adelaide has been a key priority for the State Government. Emirates once again flying daily direct into Adelaide will further drive South Australia’s economic growth – set to deliver an estimated $160 million in tourism expenditure and freight exports and create more than 315 full-time tourism-related jobs for South Australians,” Malinauskas said.

Matt Graham

The editor of Australian Frequent Flyer, Matt's passion for travel has taken him to over 70 countries… with the help of frequent flyer points, of course!
Matt's favourite destinations (so far) are Germany, Brazil & Kazakhstan. His interests include economics, aviation & foreign languages, and he has a soft spot for good food and red wine.

You can connect with Matt by posting on the Australian Frequent Flyer community forum and tagging @AFF Editor.