Singapore Airlines will begin daily nonstop flights between Singapore Changi and Western Sydney International (Nancy-Bird Walton) Airport on 23 November 2026, Simple Flying reported on 1 September 2026, drawing on OAG schedule data. The great-circle distance is 3,374 nautical miles (6,249 km) each way. The airline will use a 303-seat Airbus A350-900 in the so-called medium-haul layout: 40 business seats in a 1-2-1 arrangement and 263 economy seats at 3-3-3 with a 32-inch pitch. Simple Flying said there is currently no indication that the three-class, 253-seat A350-900 with premium economy will be used on this pairing.
OAG listings quoted in that 1 September article show the December pair as SQ261 from Changi in the late morning, arriving Western Sydney in the late evening after about seven hours 50 minutes, and SQ262 leaving Western Sydney at 23:55 and reaching Changi at 05:15 the next day after about eight hours 20 minutes. One table in the same piece lists the outbound local departure as 11:20 a.m.; a combined Sydney-area table in the same article lists 11:30 a.m. Both are attributed to the December file, not independently re-timed here. Earlier March coverage had used SQ201/SQ202; those numbers are not mixed into this account.
Western Sydney International is described as operating 24 hours without the slot and curfew limits that apply at Sydney Kingsford Smith. Simple Flying said that fully open window is why the new service has a late-evening arrival and departure, something the carrier had sought at Kingsford Smith and could not have. Combined with four daily Changi–Kingsford Smith flights, the new route brings Singapore Airlines to five daily passenger services to the Sydney area from 23 November. The same report said Singapore Airlines will be Western Sydney’s first long-haul operator and the third passenger carrier to start there, after Jetstar and Air New Zealand, with VietJet Air due in January 2027.
The A350-900 is a twin-engine widebody. The 303-seat two-class count and the 40/263 split are taken from the 1 September Simple Flying article; they are not inferred from other Singapore Airlines A350 layouts. Equipment in a schedule file can still change after tickets are issued. The illustration with this story is an original scene of an Airbus A350-900 in Singapore Airlines colours, not a photograph of a particular SQ261 departure, and it is not a registration.
Simple Flying also published December capacity figures for Singapore Airlines to Australia as a whole: 416,720 round-trip seats, described as a record and 4% above the prior high attributed to August 2026, with 672 departures and eight Australian routes including daily Western Sydney on the A350-900. Those Australia-wide totals are the magazine’s OAG read for December, not a second independent audit. Travellers looking at Changi–Western Sydney from late November should check the operating aircraft and timings on the ticket.
This item is a schedule read dated 1 September 2026, not the March ticket-sale announcement restated as breaking news. The 23 November start date, daily year-round pattern, 303-seat two-class A350-900 and Western Sydney 24-hour operation are the facts Simple Flying attached to the new OAG file. Flight numbers and clock times are given only as that magazine reported them from OAG, including the 11:20 versus 11:30 outbound discrepancy in its own tables.
Sources: Simple Flying, 1 September 2026; OAG figures as reported by Simple Flying
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