This Budget Airline Is Making It Easier to Get to Turkey — What to Know

The new flights will start in September of next year.

By Alison Fox Alison Fox

Alison Fox is a Travel + Leisure contributor. She has also written for Parents.com, The Wall Street Journal, and amNewYork. When she’s not in New York City, she can be found at the beach or on the slopes. Travel + Leisure Editorial Guidelines Published on November 15, 2024

Close Suleymaniye Mosque and Golden Horn harbor in Istanbul, Turkey. Photo:

Alexander Spatari/Getty Images

Icelandic carrier Icelandair will launch new flights from its hub in Reykjavik to Istanbul next year, making it easier — and cheaper — to connect to the Turkish city from the United States.

The airline will first launch the flights on Sept. 5, 2025, and plans to operate them four times each week, Icelandair shared with Travel + Leisure. The flight time from Reykjavik to Istanbul will take about five hours and 30 minutes.

“In recent years, we have seen increased interest in travel between Asia and Iceland and with these new connections, we are further strengthening our sales and distribution network,” Bogi Nils Bogason, the president and CEO of Icelandair, said in a statement shared with T+L. “We are excited to continue reinforcing our route network as well as connecting to exciting markets for our customers and tourism in Iceland.”

The new flight also marks an expansion of Icelandair’s codeshare partnership with Turkish Airlines. One-way flights from Reykjavik to Istanbul start at $406, according to a Google Flights search.

While this new route does not travel directly from the U.S., it will make getting to Turkey easier for American travelers thanks to Icelandair’s extensive reach in North America. In total, the airline operates service to more than a dozen different cities in North America, including New York, Baltimore, Pittsburgh, Chicago, Detroit, Denver, Portland, and more.

The airline uses a hub-and-spoke model in which all flights connect through Reykjavik before heading on to other destinations and has made a business out of connecting smaller U.S. cities to Europe and beyond. The airline has argued Iceland’s geographic location often makes it the simplest and shortest one-stop connection to Europe, and the relatively small Keflavík International Airport (KEF) in Reykjavik allows for shorter layovers. As a bonus, travelers can take advantage of Icelandair’s free stopover program and spend a few days in the “land of fire and ice” along the way.

To expand this effort, Icelandair partnered with Southwest Airlines to offer international connections to Southwest’s customers starting next year. Icelandair is Southwest’s first international partner airline.