Air France summer ramp

Air France is using summer 2026 to do two things at once: add more flights inside Europe and swap more long-haul flying onto newer jets. The airline says it will run up to 630 daily short- and medium-haul flights to more than 90 destinations this summer, while long-haul capacity rises 2% from summer 2025. (corporate.airfrance.com) That starts in Paris, because Paris-Charles de Gaulle is the airline’s main connecting hub. Air France says its 2026 summer network will cover close to 170 destinations in 73 countries, which means the extra European flights are feeding a much larger long-haul map. (corporate.airfrance.com) On the long-haul side, the clearest push is toward North America. Air France will start Paris-Charles de Gaulle to Las Vegas on April 15, 2026 with three Airbus A350-900 flights a week, making Las Vegas its 19th destination in the United States and its 26th in North America. (corporate.airfrance.com) New York is getting denser too, not just broader. Air France says it will add a second daily Paris-Charles de Gaulle to Newark flight in June 2026, bringing the combined total with Delta Air Lines to as many as 11 daily flights to John F. Kennedy and Newark in summer 2026. (corporate.airfrance.com) Asia is growing in a more selective way. The airline says Manila will rise to seven weekly flights, Tokyo-Haneda to 11 weekly flights, and service to Riyadh in Saudi Arabia will resume with up to five weekly flights after being suspended since 2020. (prnewswire.com) Inside Europe, Air France is leaning hardest into summer leisure demand. It says frequencies will increase from Paris-Charles de Gaulle to cities including Athens, Milan, Rome, Florence, Venice, Dubrovnik, and Ibiza, while Paris-Orly will focus on the French domestic and Corsica network. (prnewswire.com) The aircraft shift is a separate story from the route map, but it changes what passengers actually get onboard. Air France says about 40% of its long-haul capacity was already being operated by new-generation aircraft at the end of March 2026, and the share will keep rising through the year. (prnewswire.com) When Air France says “new-generation aircraft,” it is mainly talking about planes like the Airbus A350 for long-haul flying and the Airbus A220 for shorter routes. Parent company Air France-KLM says fleet modernization will continue in 2026 with more Airbus A350, Airbus A220, Airbus A321neo, and Airbus A320neo deliveries across the group. (airfranceklm.com) That matters because newer jets cut fuel burn and usually arrive with newer cabins at the same time. Air France says its fleet-renewal plan is centered on aircraft that consume 20% to 25% less fuel than the planes they replace, while also reducing noise. (corporate.airfrance.com) So the summer 2026 plan is not just “more flights.” It is Air France concentrating more traffic through Paris, adding North America where demand is strongest, restoring selected Asia and Middle East service, and using newer aircraft to do more of the long-haul work. (corporate.airfrance.com)