Air India to fly Dreamliner on Delhi-Manila route from October 25

Air India will begin flying a larger 256-seat Boeing 787 Dreamliner on its Delhi-Manila route from October 25, 2026, upgrading from the 188-seat Airbus A321 currently used on the daily service.

The route has expanded quickly since its October 2025 debut, growing from five weekly flights to a full daily schedule within about a year.

Strong demand is behind the upgrade, with load factors on the Manila-Delhi sector twice touching the low 80s, according to aviation analyst Ameya Joshi of Network Thoughts.

Air India’s expansion comes as competitors circle the route: IndiGo has applied for approval from the Civil Aeronautics Board of the Philippines to fly to Manila and Cebu.

Philippine Airlines is also planning to launch Delhi and Mumbai flights during the winter schedule, under a bilateral agreement allowing up to 28 weekly flights between the two nations’ major cities.

More than 60,000 Indian travellers visited the Philippines in the first half of 2026, up 43% year-on-year, a surge partly attributed to visa-free entry for Indian citizens.

Visa-free access for Indian passport holders travelling to the Philippines has been cited by industry watchers as a key driver behind the surge in leisure and business travel between the two countries.

India and the Philippines elevated their bilateral relationship to a strategic partnership in 2025, a diplomatic shift that has coincided with expanded airline interest in connecting the two markets.

IndiGo, which already dominates India’s domestic skies with roughly two-thirds market share, has been steadily building out its international network beyond South Asia and the Gulf in recent quarters.

The Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner that Air India will deploy on the upgraded Manila service is a twin-aisle, twin-class aircraft commonly used on the airline’s long-haul international routes.

Air India currently operates the Delhi-Manila route on a daily basis using the 188-seat Airbus A321, having scaled up from an initial five weekly flights when the service launched in October 2025.

Photo by Steve Knight, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 2.0