With different estimates pinning people of Indian origin as making up between 5% and 7% of Canada’s population, there is significant market potential in airlines running flights between the two countries.
As part of its efforts to grow its network to India by 40% in a single year, national airline Air Canada launched a fifth-freedom route between Toronto and Mumbai in October 2024.
Running on the carrier’s fleet of Boeing 787-8 and 787-9 planes, the flight between Toronto Pearson (YYZ) and Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport (BOM) in Mumbai operated as a fifth-freedom flight with a stopover in London Heathrow (LHR) to pick up additional passengers. The total flight time of just over 22 hours with the stop.
Air Canada is not bringing back its Toronto-Mumbai flight in 2027
With Indian flag carrier Air India launching a new direct route between Toronto and Mumbai taking just over 15 hours at the end of October, Air Canada has confirmed that it is no longer bringing back its stopover flight in 2027.
The airline cited operational inefficiencies, specifically the passenger traffic numbers relative to the challenges around needing to avoid Russian airspace when flying between the two cities, as the primary reason that it chose to discontinue the route.
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Air Canada has previously also cited jet fuel prices as “affecting some lower profitability routes and flights which now are no longer economically feasible.”
The cancelation of the Toronto-Mumbai route is part of wider network cuts that also include the axing of flights between Calgary and Delhi and Toronto and Mumbai, as well as a route between Montreal and the Algerian capital of Algiers.
For the coming year, Air Canada will consolidate its Indian network to Delhi Indira Gandhi International Airport (DEL) with a year-round flight from Toronto and a seasonal route from Montréal-Trudeau International Airport (YUL).
Air India has taken over the route between Toronto and Mumbai from Air Canada.
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Why did Air Canada cancel the Toronto-Mumbai flight?
Air Canada is still presenting India as an important destination for the airline due to the large Indian diaspora and business connections between the two countries.
Yet the two remaining routes are a significant scale-back from the peak four flights to India from Canadian cities that it had been running in 2025 when it pinned a lot of its business growth hopes onto the Indian subcontinent.
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“With new non-stop flights from Mumbai-Toronto, the addition of new flights to Calgary from Delhi via London Heathrow, together with the unparalleled connectivity from our robust North American network, we are solidifying Air Canada as the leading airline offering the most travel options between India and Canada,” Air Canada’s Executive Vice President of Revenue And Network Planning Mark Galardo said when announcing the new routes at the time.
In 2027, the carrier hopes to redirect its Boeing 787 planes to flights to Tel Aviv (TLV) and Dubai (DXB) that it had to cancel as a result of the U.S. war in Iran. Air Canada has not commented on specific plans beyond routes that were already announced earlier in the year.
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