Qantas' route map for late 2026 into 2027 looks noticeably different from the year before, and five cities have disappeared from the schedule entirely. For anyone booking the Australian flag carrier over the next year, here's what's changed and how to still get there.

The cull, spotted by comparing the airline's served airports from now through October 2026 against the November 2026–September 2027 schedule, includes one international and four domestic cuts. Seoul Incheon is the big international loss: Qantas flew there sub-daily from Sydney on A330s from late 2022 until May 2025, but the route now belongs entirely to Jetstar, which went daily after Qantas pulled out. The logic is classic group strategy — Jetstar captures the price-sensitive crowd while Qantas' widebodies move to higher-yield routes.

Domestically, Busselton in Western Australia lost its QantasLink F100 link to Perth in October 2025 and is now completely unserved. Proserpine (the Whitsundays gateway) and Mt. Gambier both went Qantas-only to Qantas-free, though Jetstar and Virgin still fly to Proserpine from Brisbane, and REX covers both Mt. Gambier markets from Adelaide and Melbourne. Lord Howe Island is the trickiest: QantasLink's Dash 8-200 service from Sydney ended in May 2025, and after a brief SkyTrans-run interlude under the QF code, the route now operates under SkyTrans' own code. Crucially, Qantas still codeshares, so you can book it with Qantas points and connect onto the Qantas network at Sydney.

Context matters here: Qantas and Jetstar together control about 53% of the Australian market and a dominant 59% domestically, so when they reshuffle, whole towns can lose air service overnight — Busselton being the clearest example.

It's not all subtraction. From November 2026, Qantas plans two genuinely new destinations. Las Vegas launches on December 29, a three-times-weekly 787-9 service from Sydney covering roughly 12,400 km — a rare direct Australia-to-Vegas option. And Western Sydney International, the brand-new airport, gets its first Qantas flights on March 28, 2027, with four-weekly Alliance E190 services from both Brisbane and Melbourne.

For travellers, the takeaways are practical: Seoul-bound flyers should look at Jetstar from Sydney or one of the four daily competitors now on the route (Asiana's A380s, Korean Air's 787-10s, Jetstar and Trinity Airways), Whitsundays holidaymakers shift to Jetstar or Virgin via Brisbane, and Mt. Gambier-bound passengers book REX. Lord Howe Island trips can still be booked through Qantas thanks to the codeshare. Meanwhile, the new Sydney–Las Vegas route and Western Sydney services open up planning options most frequent flyers haven't priced in yet.

Story via Simple Flying.