Part 2: What price should you be paying for business class flights in 2026/27?

Part 2: What price should you be paying for business class flights in 2026/27? 

This is the second article in what I hope will be a semi-regular series looking at the historical lowest fares on popular routes with European starting points. I will also look at the next six months for the lowest-cost routings and airlines. If you want to see Part 1, which covered destinations such as NYC, LA, Cape Town, and Buenos Aires, you can find it here. 

All prices quoted are for return business class fares per person. I have excluded Norse Airlines, as its premium product is premium economy, and Icelandair, whose business class does not have lie-flat seats. 

The lowest prices featured can sometimes be a rare one-off sale for a particular reason, or the lowest forward fares may only be available on one or two departure dates, which you will need to bear in mind. So I would take them with a slight pinch of salt, but they give you a starting point. Also, if you are not familiar with the airline, make sure you check what their business class is like and be aware that some airlines do not serve alcohol even in business class.

I recommend using Google Flights rather than an online travel agent site. This is because the fares are mainly direct with the airlines, which I generally advise, particularly if flying via or to the Middle East, which still has the potential for disruption. Booking directly with the airline or a “proper” travel agency, rather than an online-only service that may have patchy customer service during disruptions, is usually worth a few extra pounds. There are other advantages of using Google Flights too,  such as being able to set alerts for price changes and seeing what type of business class seat is currently on the flight.

If we have missed a destination you would like to see, then let us know in the comments below.

Hong Kong

Historic fares over 12 months:

Current cheapest fares for next 6 months:

Beijing

Lowest fares for the next 6 months:

Tokyo

Tokyo used to be extremely expensive for air fares compared to much of Asia, but while direct flights still are, connecting flights have become quite reasonable. This is particularly true when departing from Scandinavia.

Historic fares over 12 months:

Lowest fares for the next 6 months:

Mauritius

Hawaii

If ever there was an example of the glory days of business class travel during the mid to late 2010s it was Hawaii. Gone are the days of the £1000 fares to Hawaii now, sadly. It was always an oddity given the length of the journey there. From being a very reasonable price before Covid, Hawaii is now priced at the level I would expect for a flight of 16+ hours plus connecting time.

So why have prices more than doubled? Around 2018–2020, Dublin was famous among European aviation geeks for “ex-EU” business class deals, regularly dropping sub-£1,200 round-trip fares to Hawaii via British Airways, American, or United. Today, finding a business class ticket on that exact same route for under £2,500 to £3,000 is rare.

This massive price spike is the result of a market reset in how airlines operate transatlantic and premium leisure routes. Before 2020, UK and European travelers routinely booked flights starting in Dublin because the Irish market had lower premium passenger demand and lower aviation taxes compared to London. Legacy alliances (like Oneworld and SkyTeam) aggressively slashed Dublin-to-US fares to steal customers from each other. Since the pandemic, airlines have completely overhauled their pricing algorithms. They realised travellers were exploiting these loops, and they aggressively closed the price gap between direct UK departures and connecting Irish departures to protect their profit margins. 

Prior to Covid, the business class market was also all about business travellers, whereas since then the market has grown for leisure travelers and shrunk for corporate travel. So airlines no longer have to offer cheap tickets to leisure travellers to fill empty seats. With oil prices rising, airlines have also become more efficient with smaller aircraft rather than flying with empty seats.

Historic fares over 12 months:

Lowest fares for the next 6 months:

Mumbai 

Historic fares over 12 months:

 Lowest fares for the next 6 months:

Found a good fare for the next 6 months, or want to see me feature other destinations? Let us know in the comments below.