Western Sydney Airport Opens With 4 Million Passengers

Western Sydney Airport takes its first passenger flight at 11am on Sunday 25 October, when a Jetstar Airbus A320 lifts off for the Gold Coast. On the published schedules, the new airport will carry roughly 4 million passengers and more than 25,000 flights in its first full year. The terminal sitting on the 1,780-hectare site at Badgerys Creek is built for 10 million. The gap between those two numbers is the most useful thing to understand about the Western Sydney Airport opening, and it is the number most often left out.

What is actually flying on day one

Three carriers matter in the first weeks. Jetstar opens with up to 14 weekly services to Melbourne, four to the Gold Coast and three to Brisbane, with one-way fares to Melbourne from $69. Air New Zealand begins international services on 26 October. Singapore Airlines follows on 23 November.

Qantas is not among them. The mainline carrier starts on 28 March 2027 using QantasLink Embraer E190s on four weekly rotations each to Melbourne and Brisbane. Those aircraft seat 94 people. The A320s Jetstar will use seat up to 186, so the Qantas entry adds frequencies rather than seats. It also caps the near-term premium cabin offering, and launch fares start at $99 one way in economy and $299 in business.

Passengers familiar with Sydney Airport will notice a different constraint rather than a different experience. Western Sydney Airport is curfew-free, while the Sydney Airport Curfew Act 1995 restricts movements at Kingsford Smith to between 11pm and 6am. The catch arrives on 1 November 2026, which the Commonwealth has set as the intended gazettal date for Western Sydney Airport to be open for night movements. Until that is gazetted, the curfew-free advantage is a headline rather than a timetable fact.

The forecast that sits behind the forecast

The Western Sydney Airport Master Plan 2025-45, endorsed in May 2026, puts central passenger demand at 8.4 million a year by 2030, split 5.4 million domestic and 3.0 million international. By 2045 the mix inverts, with 11.1 million international against 8.2 million domestic, a total of 19.3 million.

The runway can carry roughly 37 million passengers a year before a second parallel runway becomes necessary. Earthworks for that second runway are planned to begin shortly after opening, with commissioning in the mid-2050s.

The comparison that gets quoted most often is Sydney Airport's own outlook of 72 million passengers a year by the mid-2040s, up from 41.4 million in 2024. Set side by side, the two airports are being built for very different Sydney economies, and the passenger forecasts will not converge for two decades.

What has already been spent

The federal government describes the airport as the centrepiece of close to $18 billion in Western Sydney investment, including the future Sydney Metro airport line and upgrades to Elizabeth Drive, Fifteenth Avenue and Mamre Road. Those road commitments build on the M12 Motorway, which is already open.

The Master Plan makes a larger claim, forecasting NSW investment will be $96 billion higher by 2063, with $85 billion of that in Western Sydney. That figure rests on aerotropolis and Bradfield development proceeding, which is a separate question from the airport itself.

On construction employment, the published figure is 12,800 jobs with roughly half going to local workers, and more than $500 million flowing to over 360 Western Sydney businesses. The Master Plan forecasts 6,000 to 8,500 permanent airport jobs once annual passengers reach 10 million.

Getting there is still the unsolved part

Nothing in the opening schedule changes the access problem. The airport sits about 50 kilometres west of the CBD, and the rail line is not part of the opening-day proposition. The Sydney Metro Western Sydney Airport line has been in testing, with the first of twelve trains arriving at the Orchard Hills stabling facility in July 2026, but passengers will not ride to the terminal until that line opens.

Road access depends on the Fifteenth Avenue and Elizabeth Drive works that share a $2.4 billion funding envelope with the Commonwealth. Those contracts, and the timing of the second runway earthworks, are set out in the NSW Budget 2026-27 transport papers.

For anyone planning to use the airport in its first year, the practical advice is thin: Jetstar to Melbourne, the Gold Coast and Brisbane; Air New Zealand and Singapore Airlines if the international schedule works; everything else through Kingsford Smith until Qantas arrives in March. Read more in The City's infrastructure coverage and our Parramatta and Western Sydney desk. Official project information sits with Western Sydney Airport.