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Four extra Christmas flights to Olbia from Trieste, as Volotea lifts winter seats 75%

Aeroitalia added four extra Trieste to Olbia flights for the holidays, on 24 and 30 December and 2 and 6 January, it said on 8 October. Alghero gets four of its own, on 23, 26 and 29 December and 4 January. The flights are one-off seasonal additions rather than a scheduled route, announced alongside a third weekly Trieste to Salerno frequency for the winter. Gaetano Intrieri, chief executive of Aeroitalia, said the airline was glad to strengthen its presence at Trieste, which it called a strategic point in its network. They land on top of a wider winter build-up at Olbia. Volotea said in August that it would keep its Olbia base running through the winter season with 75% more seats on sale than in the same period a year earlier. Madrid runs in winter for the first time, Bologna returns, Venice, Verona, Turin, Paris Orly and Barcelona run through the season, and Naples operates over the end-of-year holidays alone. That is eight winter destinations on Volotea alone. The framing matters. Volotea and the airport both pitched the winter programme at Sardinian residents and year-round mobility rather than inbound tourism, and the island's October 2025 figure of 1,416,009 overnight stays grew just 1.0% while September rose 11.7%. Winter remains Sardinia's thinnest season. For visitors this means more direct ways into Olbia over Christmas than a normal winter offers, several of them on single fixed dates with no alternative if they sell out.

10 October 2026

Source: Trieste Airport

Olbia waterfront promenade with palm trees and the sea, Gallura, Sardinia

The Christmas flights, date by date

Aeroitalia and Trieste Airport announced the additions on 8 October 2026. From Trieste:

  • Olbia: 24 December, 30 December, 2 January, 6 January

  • Alghero: 23 December, 26 December, 29 December, 4 January

These are extraordinary flights tied to the holiday period, not the start of a scheduled route, and neither announcement gave aircraft types or an on-sale date. Times, availability and fare conditions are on the airline's own booking engine. The same announcement raised Trieste to Salerno from two weekly flights to three, on Monday, Friday and Sunday, with a fourth on Saturday in November and over Christmas, a change both parties linked to the planned closure of Naples airport in November 2026.

Fabio Gallo, chief executive of Trieste Airport, said the extra Salerno frequencies and the Christmas flights to Alghero and Olbia widen the options open to passengers.

Olbia's winter map

The holiday flights arrive on top of a larger change announced on 5 August 2026, when Volotea confirmed it would extend its Olbia base into the winter season. Its winter destinations from Olbia:

  • Year-round: Paris Orly and Barcelona, the latter three times a week on Tuesday, Thursday and Sunday

  • Through the winter season: Venice, Verona and Turin

  • New for winter: Madrid, served in the winter months for the first time

  • Returning: Bologna

  • Holiday period only: Naples

Volotea put the increase at 75% more seats on sale than in the same period a year earlier. It did not publish an absolute seat count, frequencies for Madrid, Bologna or Naples, or the number of based aircraft.

Who the winter flights are for

Both companies described the programme in terms of residents rather than tourists. Valeria Rebasti, international market director at Volotea, said the aim was to garantire collegamenti stabili dal nord della Sardegna anche nei mesi invernali, to guarantee stable connections from northern Sardinia in the winter months too. Silvio Pippobello, chief executive of Geasar and Sogeaal, the companies that run the Olbia and Alghero airports, called wider connectivity in low-demand periods a condizione essenziale, an essential condition, for supporting tourist flows and local business.

That reading fits the season. In the Region's 2025 figures the island recorded 1,416,009 overnight stays in October, up 1.0% on 2024, against 3,485,434 in September, up 11.7%. The lengthening season reaches into September and thins out quickly after it. Holiday traffic to Sardinia is in large part Sardinians travelling home, which is a different market from the summer one and books differently.

A note on the numbers

The 75% is Volotea's own figure for seats put on sale for the winter season against the same period of the previous year. It is capacity offered, not passengers carried, and it covers one airline at one base, not the airport as a whole. Geasar has not published a winter capacity total across all carriers. The eight destinations listed above are Volotea's; other airlines serve Olbia in winter and are not counted here. The overnight-stay figures come from the Region's Osservatorio del Turismo tables for 2025, drawn from the ROSS1000 system on 18 June 2026, and private lets are under-recorded in them, with only 31.8% of private lodgings in Gallura reporting.

Sources: Trieste Airport and Aeroitalia announcement (8 October 2026) · Olbia.it, the four Trieste to Olbia dates (8 October 2026) · Geasar, Volotea winter base at Olbia (5 August 2026) · Alguer.it, Olbia winter programme (5 August 2026) · Regione Sardegna, Osservatorio del Turismo, Movimento turistico 2025