KLM Expediting Airbus A330-200 Retirement Plans

KLM has 126 aircraft in its mainline fleet ranging from narrowbody Boeing 737s and Airbus A321neos, to larger Boeing 777s, 787s, and soon to be Airbus A350-900s. The carrier has a small subfleet of Airbus A330s, more specifically five A330-200s and five A330-300s at the time of publication.

In September 2023, the Air France-KLM Group placed a 50-widebody plane order with Airbus, with 22 A350-900s being allocated to KLM, and 25 A350-900s and 3 A350-1000s going to Air France. KLM’s -900s will be used to replace both its aging A330s and Boeing 777-200ERs.

In an interview with Flight Global, KLM Chief Executive Marjan Rintel said the carrier is accelerating retirement of its A330 fleet, starting with the smaller and older A330-200s, the majority of which were first delivered between 2005 and 2006.

KLM expects to take delivery of its first A350-900 (registered PH-ZNA) in late August or early September, and will put it in service in September. It’s not clear yet which route they plan to use to launch this new plane on. In total, they are looking at up to three A350 deliveries for 2026, and will retire the equivalent number of A330-200s. One of its oldest (PH-AOA) was retired in June 2026, bringing the remaining A330-200 count down to five.  

KLM currently operates its A330-200s to a handful of cities across the globe including parts of the Southern Caribbean, Canada, Boston (USA), parts of Africa and Saudi Arabia. Most other long haul routes are served with their newer Boeing 787s and 777s. As the A330-300s are a few years younger, they are expected to remain in the fleet some time until around 2029 closer to when the bulk of A350s are delivered.

Credit: KLM

This is welcome news, especially for business class travelers, as we can finally move away from the old-school 2-2-2 lie-flats. The A350s will seat 331 passengers, split between 34 Stelia Opera lie-flat business class suites in a 1-2-1 config, 26 of the popular Collins MiQ recliner seats in premium economy (2-4-2), with the remaining 271 in economy, featuring Recaro R3 seats in a 3-3-3 layout.

Due to revised certification guideless, World Business Class (WBC) on their A350s will unfortunately not be available for booking when the first two aircraft enter service. The seat manufacturer is working to complete the certification process as quickly as possible in order to make this cabin class available to KLM customers at the earliest opportunity.

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