While today’s aviation sector is one of considerable modernity, we would be nowhere without the decades of history that have elapsed to get us to this point, and the various social and technological advances that they have brought. As it happens, some airlines around the world that are still active today have been around long enough to witness these changes for themselves.
In this article, we will take a closer look at the life and times of the oldest airlines around the world today that operate under their original names. While, in some instances, there are older carriers out there (avianca, for example, traces its roots back to 1919, but has only operated under its current name since 1940 following a merger), our focus will be on those whose identity has remained constant.
KLM Royal Dutch Airlines (Netherlands)
Founded in October 1919
The oldest of these is Dutch flag carrier and SkyTeam member KLM, which was founded 105 years ago on October 7th, 1919. According to the airline’s website, eight investors from the business and banking world helped get the company, known in full at the time as Koninklijke Luchtvaart Maatschappij voor Nederland en Koloniën (‘Royal Dutch Airlines for the Netherlands and Colonies’) off the ground.
It would be less than a year later that the newly formed Dutch flag carrier operated its first flight, which took place on May 17th, 1920. The airline notes that the aircraft involved was a leased De Havilland DH-16, flown by a pilot named Jerry Shaw from London to Amsterdam, that was carrying “two journalists, a letter from the Mayor of London to his counterpart in Amsterdam, and a stack of newspapers.”
In the more than a century that has followed this inaugural flight, KLM has gone from strength to strength to establish itself not just as one of the most important airlines in Europe but, indeed, in the world as a whole as well. The scale of its present-day operations is illustrated in scheduling data made available by Cirium, an aviation analytics company, which shows that, in 2025, KLM has scheduled:
- 266,353 passenger-carrying flights.
- 43,404,143 seats.
- 71,949,126,479 available seat miles (ASMs).
KLM’s network is focused through its hub at Amsterdam Schiphol Airport (AMS), where many of its passengers connect between regional, short-haul, and long-haul flights operated by the Dutch flag carrier. Today, data from ch-aviation shows that the airline has 186 aircraft in its fleet at an average age of 12.3 years old, featuring regional jets, narrowbodies, and widebodies from Airbus, Boeing, and Embraer.
Qantas (Australia)
Founded in November 1920
Just over a year after KLM came into existence, another flag carrier that remains active under its original name was founded all the way over on the other side of the world. The airline in question was Queensland and Northern Territory Aerial Services, which is known today by its acronym of Qantas. Australia’s national airline was founded on November 16th, 1920 by Paul McGinness and Hudson Fysh.
According to the Qantas website, McGinness and Fysh were “Australian Flying Corps veterans [who] envisaged an air service connecting Australia to the world.” The carrier recalls that its first aircraft was an Avro 504K that had been built in Sydney, with its first passenger flight taking place in November 1922 with 84-year-old outback pioneer Alexander Kennedy onboard between Charleville and Cloncurry.
In the more than 102 years that have elapsed since this first flight, Qantas has grown to be the worldwide airline that its founders initially envisaged. Flying out of multiple hubs all over Australia, the carrier serves intercontinental destinations as far and wide as Europe and North America, with 278,327 passenger flights scheduled this year. These will offer 40,370,832 seats and 62,812,083,567 ASMs.
Today, the mainline Qantas fleet consists of 127 aircraft with an average age of 14.9 years old. The carrier flies widebodies from the Airbus A330 and A380 series as well as the Boeing 787. Meanwhile, its mainline narrowbody operations make use of Boeing 737 twinjets. Going forward, the Australian national airline has 61 aircraft on order, with the models being the A321XLR, A350-1000, 787-9, and 787-10.
Iberia (Spain)
Founded in June 1927
Returning to Europe for the world’s third-oldest active airline that is still operating under its own name, we have Spanish flag carrier and oneworld member 
Iberia. According to the national airline’s website, the carrier was formally founded on June 28th, 1927 under the full name Iberia, Compañía Aérea de Transporte. Its first flight, from Madrid to Barcelona, took to the skies in December of that year.
Initially, as Iberia notes, the airline concentrated on short-haul operations within Spain, and from the mainland to the Canary Islands and North Africa. However, its network soon grew, with Portugal added to its portfolio of destinations in 1939. After the Second World War, Iberia’s network experienced a larger-scale boom with the introduction of transatlantic flights to Buenos Aires, Argentina.
Today, Iberia’s long-haul network retains a strong South American flavor, but also serves destinations in Africa, North America, and Asia. Closer to home, the carrier’s aircraft can be found at most of Europe’s major hubs, giving Spain strong representation on the continent. This year, the carrier has scheduled 227,928 passenger flights, offering 36,959,553 seats and 61,145,614,364 available seat miles.
Unlike the diverse fleets of KLM and Qantas that we have covered thus far, Iberia favors a far more uniform approach. Indeed, all 122 of its aircraft (that have an average age of 10.3 years old), as well as the 24 that it has on order, come from multinational European planemaker Airbus. The families present in Iberia’s fleet today include the A320, A320neo, A330, A330neo (on lease from Iberojet), and A350.
LOT Polish Airlines (Poland)
Founded in December 1928
18 months after the foundation of Iberia, fellow European flag carrier LOT Polish Airlines came into existence. The airline was founded on December 29th, 1928 by the Polish government at the time, and commenced operations just days later on January 1st, 1929. As the Polish flag carrier and Star Alliance member’s website recalls, the airline initially operated a small fleet of aircraft on domestic routes.
While the Second World War saw the carrier’s early growth put on ice, it bounced back strongly after the conflict, establishing an international presence with a growing European market. 1955 saw LOT Polish Airlines carry its millionth passenger, and the carrier kept on growing ever since. This included the development of a long-haul network, which, in the 1970s and ’80s, featured destinations such as:
- New York.
- Singapore.
- Toronto.
The carrier also made history as the first operator from Central and Eastern Europe to fly aircraft produced by US manufacturing juggernaut Boeing, with the introduction of three 767s as it entered the 1990s. Today, LOT Polish Airlines serves a huge variety of regional, short-haul, and long-haul routes, with 110,529 passenger flights scheduled in 2025. These will offer 13,990,190 seats and 16,505,550,917 ASMs.
As for the airline’s fleet, this is a comparatively small affair, consisting of just 89 aircraft (with an average age of 12.3 years old). Going forward, LOT Polish Airlines also has outstanding orders for a further 11 aircraft. However, with that being said, this relatively small fleet is a diverse one, with families such as the Boeing 737NG, 737 MAX, 787, Embraer E-Jet, and Embraer E-Jet E2 all present at LOT.
Cubana de Aviación (Cuba)
Founded in October 1929
The fifth airline on this list is rather different to the four carriers covered thus far, both in terms of its size and location. The operator in question is Cuban flag carrier Cubana de Aviación, which came into existence, as AeroFlap notes, on October 8th, 1929. Established by American businessman Clement Melville Keys, Cubana initially focused on charter and mail flights, as well as operating a flying school.
However, it wasn’t long before scheduled operations commenced, with these taking flight in October 1930. In the years that followed, Cubana would go on to operate a fascinating variety of 20th-century aircraft, including designs such as the Douglas DC-3 and DC-4, the Ford Trimotor, and the Lockheed Model 10 Electra, serving routes both in Latin America and further afield to the US and Europe.
Nowadays, Cubana de Aviación is a relatively small airline, with just 17 aircraft in its fleet (most of which are inactive) at a fairly hefty average age of 20.6 years old. Among the few Western designs that serve the carrier are a leased Airbus A340-300, a leased ATR 42-500, and two ATR 72-200s. Its remaining planes are all of Soviet heritage, such as the Antonov An-158, Ilyushin Il-96, and Tupolev Tu-204.
Given the carrier’s small and largely inactive fleet, it is unsurprising to see that the scale of Cubana de Aviación’s operations this year is much smaller than the four larger and more established carriers covered thus far. Indeed, the airline has scheduled just 2,400 passenger flights in 2025, with these services collectively offering grand totals of only 238,496 seats and 381,737,804 available seat miles.
