Southwest Airways’ brand-new partnership with Icelandair is formally dwell and accessible for reserving — however be warned, it will be a bit restricted in the interim.
Starting Thursday, clients are capable of ebook itineraries that includes connections between Southwest and Icelandair through Southwest’s strong station at Baltimore/Washington Worldwide Thurgood Marshall Airport (BWI).
Which means you may begin a visit with a flight on a Southwest jet and join seamlessly — each you and your luggage — to an Icelandair flight to Keflavik Airport (KEF) in Reykjavik. From there, you may even proceed onward, on the identical itinerary, to extra locations in Europe.
The launch of its first airline partnership, for which TPG witnessed the formal signing earlier this 12 months in Washington, D.C., is a significant step for Southwest.
“This is a vital milestone in our plan to develop how and the place our clients can journey,” Southwest’s govt vp Ryan Inexperienced mentioned final month on the service’s earnings name.
A slim partnership — at first
As talked about, the partnership — often called an interline settlement — might be pretty slim from the outset.
In the meanwhile, you possibly can solely ebook Southwest-Icelandair itineraries utilizing Icelandair’s web site and a few third-party on-line reserving companies.
You can also’t earn or redeem Rapid Rewards factors on these abroad itineraries simply but.
That is set to vary in 2026 when Southwest’s shift to assigned seating goes dwell. At that time, you can ebook flights to Iceland and on to Europe by Southwest’s reserving channels.
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And you can pay money and earn Fast Rewards factors on these bookings, or redeem factors on your journey — a shift that needs to be a giant increase for the utility of Southwest’s factors.
Learn extra: Southwest quietly unveils A-List perks for new assigned-seating setup
Find out how to ebook by the Southwest-Icelandair partnership
Within the meantime, although, we need to present you methods to ebook a Southwest-Icelandair itinerary below the partnership because it stands proper now.
Flights to Iceland
Beginning with Icelandair’s web site, for example I need to take a March spherical journey from Dallas Love Area (DAL) — Southwest’s residence airport — to KEF.
As you possibly can see, Icelandair’s web site presents up an itinerary that includes one leg from DAL to BWI aboard Southwest, adopted by a connecting flight over to Icelandair for the BWI-to-KEF leg of the journey.
Reserving flights to Europe
You may also technically ebook an itinerary to Europe by this partnership, although it is probably not probably the most environment friendly technique to get throughout the Atlantic; on prime of constructing a cease at KEF, you’d additionally need to undergo BWI (in the interim, at the very least).
Here is a visit that begins at Chicago’s Halfway Worldwide Airport (MDW) on Southwest and ends at London’s Heathrow Airport (LHR).
You’d fly on Southwest to Baltimore earlier than connecting over to Icelandair for the Reykjavik flight. As soon as at KEF, you may make a typical connection earlier than the ultimate leg to Europe — or spend a day or two (or extra) in Iceland as a part of a stopover; you possibly can slot in stopovers of as much as seven days.
Enlargement of partnership coming quickly
Much less circuitous itineraries to Europe by this partnership ought to emerge because the airways convey new Southwest bases on-line. Proper now, the partnership is concentrated solely on connections at BWI, however that can develop to Denver Worldwide Airport (DEN) and Nashville Worldwide Airport (BNA) within the not-too-distant future.
“Then we’ll consider issues from there,” Inexperienced instructed TPG final month.
Backside line
Southwest’s new partnership with Icelandair is formally dwell and accessible for bookings through Icelandair’s web site and a few third-party websites. Although it is restricted proper now (and never accessible but for Fast Rewards earnings or redemptions), it will develop considerably over the course of the following 12 months.
Throughout that point, Southwest additionally plans to announce a second worldwide airline companion, so keep tuned.
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