Air Canada is giving its Dreamliner fleet a much bigger role. From November 2026, the airline will put its Boeing 787s on 11 long-haul routes across Asia, Europe and South America — including three brand-new cities and the return of two routes dropped years ago.

The headline additions are Guangzhou, Sapporo and Dubrovnik. Vancouver–Guangzhou starts on May 4, 2027, flying three times weekly on a 787-9 and becoming Air Canada's third mainland China destination alongside Beijing and Shanghai. It also makes the carrier the only North American airline on the route, though China Southern already flies it. Vancouver–Sapporo kicks off on December 17, 2026, also three weekly — briefly claiming the only nonstop link between North America and Hokkaido, until United launched the same idea from San Francisco six days earlier. Montreal–Dubrovnik, starting May 11, 2027, marks Air Canada's first Croatia flights since summer 2019, running seasonally until late October.

Quito is the big comeback story: Ecuador returns to the network for the first time since March 2020, with 787-8 flights from both Montreal (three times weekly, from December 4, 2026) and Toronto (weekly, from December 5). Through to March 2027, Air Canada will be the only airline flying nonstop between Canada and Ecuador.

Elsewhere, Vancouver–Cancun upgrades from a 737 MAX 8 to a daily 787-9 from December 1, Toronto–Barcelona gets Dreamliner service over the winter holidays (up to daily between mid-December and early January), and Montreal–Tel Aviv, Toronto–Prague and Toronto–Stockholm all convert to the 787-9 in May and June 2027. Toronto–Phoenix gets a short, temporary 787-8 burst in November 2026.

Onboard, both the 787-8 and 787-9 come in three cabins: Signature Class with lie-flat seats in a 1-2-1 layout (everyone gets direct aisle access), Premium Economy in 2-3-2, and Economy in a comfortable 3-3-3. The -8 seats 255 passengers in total; the -9 stretches that to 298. Air Canada currently flies 40 Dreamliners, with 14 larger 787-10s on order from around the end of 2026.

For travellers, this matters in practical ways. The 787 is a quieter, lower-altitude-cabin, better-humidity aircraft than the widebodies it often replaces, which genuinely helps on 10-hour sectors like Vancouver–Guangzhou. New nonstops such as Sapporo open up Japan's ski country without a Tokyo connection, while the Quito relaunch puts the Galápagos gateway within one boarding pass of eastern Canada. Book the winter routes from December 2026 and the European and China services from spring 2027.