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The collaboration that began with much fanfare between the Turkish airline "Turkish Airlines" and "Air Albania", the Albanian company in which the state has a 10% stake, has ended ingloriously.
After announcing in November that it had put its 49% stake in Air Albania up for sale, the Turkish carrier has announced that it will start direct flights from Tirana. The Turkish Airlines website states that tickets will be available for booking from January 10. A search shows that tickets can be purchased from February at prices ranging from 51-58 euros one way.
Through Turkish Airlines, you can travel in transit from Istanbul to all over the world, while Istanbul Airport has been the largest in Europe since October, surpassing London Heathrow.
Air Albania also continues to sell tickets
On November 19, Turkish Airlines announced that it had decided to sell its entire 49% stake in Air Albania. A week later, Turkish also blocked the sale of transit tickets through Air Albania, forcing those who had purchased transit tickets to go to Istanbul via Podgorica or Pristina.
This is where the problems for the Albanian operator began. Air Albania began canceling flights to Istanbul, although it continued to sell tickets in the system and is continuing to do so, despite the Civil Aviation Authority confirming that it had suspended its license.
According to the website, Air Albania's next flight to Istanbul is scheduled for December 30, with a price of 103 euros one-way, which increases to 173 euros one-way on January 2. While the company has been selling tickets for over a month and then canceling flights, there is no official announcement and no responsibility for customers who have purchased tickets.
According to data from Tirana International Airport, Air Albania's market share by number of passengers for the period January-June 2025 has dropped to 2.5%, from 18% in 2021. Subsequently, competition from "Wizz Air" and "Ryanair" affected the activity of this operator in destinations other than Istanbul.
According to official data from Tirana International Airport, for 2024, around 408 thousand passengers traveled to and from Istanbul from Rinas, making it the sixth destination with the highest traffic, after Milan+Bergamo, London, Rome, Bologna, Treviso, Pisa.
Air Albania has never submitted a balance sheet. According to data from the Tax Office, the company's annual turnover has been 4-5 billion lek per year, while the operator has always resulted in losses, turning it into a practically bankrupt company today and causing Turkish to abandon it.
The inglorious end of Air Albania's promises
Air Albania was officially founded on May 16, 2018 as a public-private partnership between Albania and Turkey.
The airline had as its main shareholder the Turkish company Turkish Airlines (49.12%) and the remaining shares are shared by the Albanian state-owned company Albcontrol (~10%) and a private Albanian company MDN Investment (~41%).
The company, which was strongly promoted by the government, had very ambitious plans, both in expanding destinations in Europe, with lines to Italy and Britain, which were temporarily implemented, as well as those beyond it to the US, as advertised by Prime Minister Rama a year ago in a meeting with the diaspora in the US.
"We are discussing with Air Albania to finally enable a direct Air Albania flight. I can't tell you when the first flight will take place, but when it does, we will definitely do it here in New York," Rama would say in October 2024. / Monitor
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