Update, 6/3/21: United will fly their inaugural Newark-Johannesburg flight tonight on a Polaris 787-9, marking the first nonstop flight between the US and South Africa since the beginning of the pandemic. Delta plans to restart Atlanta-Johannesburg with 3 flights per week in August, but they will need to make a stop in Cape Town for the return flight as they no longer have any aircraft that can fly nonstop from Johannesburg to Atlanta. South African Airways is still in hibernation mode and isn’t selling any flights to the US.
United hasn’t flown to Cape Town since March 2020, but plans to return their seasonal Newark-Cape Town service with 3 weekly 787-9 flights running from 10/31/21-3/25/22.
United also flew their inaugural flights with a premium heavy Polaris 767-300ER from Newark to Maui today and a Polaris 787-8 from Chicago to Kona today. The Newark-Maui flight went with empty Polaris seats and the return flight tonight will also have empty Polaris seats. Sounds like a route tailor made for a Plan B award!
Update, 9/27/20: United is now selling seats on their new Hawaiian routes for travel starting on 6/3/21. The new Hawaii flights operate on Sunday, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday.
- Award availability is coach is wide open for 22.5K United miles each way. You can transfer Chase or Marriott points to United.
- You can theoretically book these routes for just 7.5K Turkish miles each way, but it’s difficult to get an agent that can book United’s long-haul Hawaii flights with Turkish miles and you can’t redeem for them online. You can transfer Citi, Capital One, or Marriott points to Turkish.
- You can also use 17.5K Singapore miles each way, and those are bookable online. You can transfer AMEX, Capital One, Chase, Citi, or Marriott points to Singapore.
Originally posted on 9/9/20:
As speculated yesterday, United has announced the following new routes:
- Newark to Maui was my most confident guess and sure enough, United will launch the route with 4 weekly 767-300ER flights starting in summer 2021. It will be the longest route that any airline has to Maui. This comes in addition to daily Newark-Honolulu service. That also means that the United 767 fleet won’t be retired.
- Another awesome Hawaii route launch is Chicago-Kona on Hawaii’s Big Island with 4 weekly flights starting in summer 2021. Best of all, that route will be served by a 787-8, which should feature all Polaris seating! United already serves Chicago to Honolulu and Maui.
- South Africa seemed like a sure bet, and it will be Newark-Johannesburg that gets the new service with daily 787-9 flights starting in spring 2021.
- Nigeria was also a giveaway, and indeed, Washington DC-Lagos, Nigeria will see 3 weekly 787-8 flights starting in spring 2021.
- Washington DC-Accra, Ghana will also see 3 weekly 787-8 flights starting in spring 2021.
- United will launch daily 787-9 service between Chicago-Delhi starting this winter!
- United will launch daily 787-9 service between San Francisco-Bangalore starting spring 2021, this may set a record for the longest United flight time.
Sadly, there’s no new Bangkok, Vienna, or South America service, but these are still some great new routes and I loved how United teased them out!
Several months ago I asked if United would pull off nonstops to both Cape Town and Johannesburg, which would be a huge win over Delta. Delta can no longer fly from Johannesburg to Atlanta nonstop due to their imminent 777 fleet retirement and their lack of 787s, so they are switching to an inconvenient triangle route from Atlanta to Johannesburg to Cape Town to Atlanta.
Sure enough, United will do just that with nonstop service from Newark to South Africa’s largest 2 cities. They will leapfrog from having no South Africa presence just 1 year ago, to having the biggest US carrier South Africa presence in 2021, which is pretty incredible!
Which of these new routes will you fly?
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50 Comments On "[Update: New Routes Launch Today, First US-South Africa Nonstop Since Pre-COVID!] New United Routes: Hawaii, South Africa, India, Nigeria, And More!"
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Newark to Maui
+1 hope they put the polaris 767 on the route. referencing my comment yesterday i see on Wikipedia that runway extension is supposed to be completed by 2021 so that is allowing UA to launch these 2 routes.
2 routes?
sorry i thought the ORD was also to OGG.
they already operate a non stop ORD-OGG
+1
For EWR OGG do you think will be same times as EWR HNL? what days would they fly or skip?
I’d assume they will be similar, but you never know. Up until a few years ago HNL-EWR used to operate at 9pm before being moved up to 4pm.
No idea what days it will operate, but if I had to guess, perhaps Sunday, Monday, Thursday, and Saturday or Sunday, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday.
Do we know the flight times for the Hawaii flights yet?
No.
EWR-OGG!!!
Whats the kosher food situation in Jberg? Perhaps a nice yeshiva break trip.
Joberg has tons of kosher food and Cape Town has some options as well. Lots of trip reports on DDF.
South Africa!!!
Incredible to see United go from zero to dominant carrier in a year!
we saw everyone go from dominant to zero in the last few months , anything and everything is possible . if all you know Elal will may start offering great customer service too 🙂
Elal great customer service?! LOL!
how does the 737 compare against 757 (and 777) in economy ? these are the planes united currently flies from ORD-KOA.
United does not fly nonstop ORD-KOA. And they certainly don’t fly a 737 or 757 to Hawaii as they would never make it.
correct, am looking at stopover flights since non-stops wont begin until summer. one option has the 737-800/900 while other has the 757-200.
The 787 is a significantly better plane than the 737/757 in most aspects.
i agree, but sadly that is not an option currently
Who can fly currently?
Hawaii has been closed since March and shows no signs of loosening up.
Aren’t they also launching the ORD-TLV this week?
They are indeed.
“Best of all, that route will be served by a 787-8, which should feature all Polaris seating!”
Do you mean the 1-2-1 config as opposed to 2-2-2 ?
Will the 787-9 have all Polaris seating?
Yes, all 788s and 789s are being converted from 2-2-2 (ex-Continental BusinessFirst seating) to 1-2-1 Polaris seating.
6/12 of United’s 788s have been converted so far.
9/32 of United’s 789s have been converted so far.
Those were supposed to have been converted this year, but then coronavirus came along…
“United is making some modifications to its 787-9s, which will increase engine thrust and improve the fuel management system. Together these changes will make the flights possible. These are entirely software changes, so it seems to be a relative easy fix.
While United will eventually install this software update throughout its 787-9 fleet, initially only a subfleet will have the changes. There’s a positive implication on that front — the subfleet of 787-9s will feature new Polaris seats, so you’ll be guaranteed new Polaris seats on these ultra long haul flights.”
Yayyyyy
Hmm, I may have to reconsider UA cards.
Nah.
Best to get a Citi Card and hope for award space to use Turkish miles for.
Using Turkish miles for Hawaii flights is pretty wonky and YMMV. Great value if you can book it, but it’s a frustrating experience.
Hats off to you Dan & JJ. without you visiting any of these places with wife and kids would be just a dream. MANY MANY MANY THANKS!!! Eternally grateful!
Nice! Thanks for sharing!
+1000000. Been taking multiple trips per year with my whole family which would never happen without Dan.
How long will the flight between Newark and Maui ?
Very similar to the existing Newark to Honolulu flight, about 9 to 11 hours.
That’s a looog time to wear a mask
Hopefully by next summer when the route launches, masks will be in the past.
Which other airline miles can I use to fly to JNB or CPT with United from EWR without fuel surcharges?
Most Star Alliance carriers.
My wife’s from Capetown. Beautiful place….
SFO-BLR surely will be wight restricted. Any idea what % of seats they’ll always need to fly empty?
They might as well be announcing Cleveland to Bali, since none of these routes will actually be flown until Covid is under control and that’s not going to happen for another year or two.
This inspired me to find out why Maui’s airport code is OGG. Turns out it was inspired by an early Maui commercial pilot whose last name was Hogg. If your friends already know how ORD was named, you can try OGG on them.
Yes! Got 8 tickets to Nigeria for Pesach!
When do they start flying to Nigeria?
So I can transfer capital one points 1:1 to turkish airlines and book United tickets to Hawaii for 15k round trip?
@Dan does Turkish still have the cheap options for their airline partners. when I searched with the link you provided it doesn’t seem so. Am I doing something wrong?
“ Delta can no longer fly from Johannesburg to Atlanta nonstop due to their imminent 777 fleet retirement and their lack of 787s, so they are switching to an inconvenient triangle route from Atlanta to Johannesburg to Cape Town to Atlanta.”
Johannesburg is closer to Newark than Cape Town, so if the plane can fly Cape Town- Newark it should be able to fly Johannesburg- Newark.
1. Delta doesn’t fly to Newark, they fly to Atlanta.
2. Johannesburg has an altitude penalty on takeoff as it sits over a mile high, which limits range.
what’s the most convenient way to check if a flight had empty seats?