Wizz Air

Is Wizz Air safe?

Yes. Wizz Air has carried 500 million passengers since it began flying in 2004 and has never had a fatal accident or lost an aircraft. Its jets average 4.5 years, under half the age of Ryanair's or easyJet's. We score it 88, a point behind easyJet and Ryanair.

The gap comes from two things. Wizz Air has had several serious incidents in the past two years, and its network takes it closer to conflict zones than any other big European low-cost airline.

Which Wizz Air airline operates my flight?

Wizz Air is a group of airlines with one brand, and the flight number prefix tells you which one:

Airline	Prefix	Certificate and regulator
Wizz Air Hungary	W6	Hungary, within the EASA system
Wizz Air Malta	W4	Malta, within the EASA system
Wizz Air UK	W9	United Kingdom, Civil Aviation Authority

Wizz Air Hungary is the original airline, based in Budapest, and Wizz Air UK flies from the London airports. A fourth airline, Wizz Air Abu Dhabi, stopped flying on 1 September 2025; the group named engine reliability in hot conditions, airspace closures and regulatory barriers as reasons. When Wizz Air returns to Abu Dhabi in October 2026, its European airlines will fly the routes.

All three use the same aircraft, manuals and training. None is an IATA member, so like Ryanair and easyJet, Wizz Air relies on regulators rather than the IOSAIOSAThe IATA Operational Safety Audit, an international audit of an airline's safety management and operations. Every IATA member must pass it.More in the glossary audit for outside checks.

What has gone wrong at Wizz Air?

No crash, but a steady list of serious incidents.

• Prague, 11 September 2025. A Wizz Air UK A321neo arriving from London Gatwick made a hard, bounced landing and struck its tail on the runway. Nobody was hurt. The Czech investigation board is leading.
• Kraków, 2 January 2025. An A321neo arriving from Milan Malpensa landed on runway 25 while a Jet2 Boeing 737 was still taking off from the same runway. Poland's investigation board, the PKBWL, classed it as a serious incident. It has not yet said who or what was at fault.
• Luton, 16 January 2020. An A321 would not lift its nose at take-off speed, even with the side stick near full back. The pilots added full thrust and it climbed away. The UK's AAIB found that the aircraft had been swapped from a smaller A320 without moving passengers, so the centre of gravity was too far forward. Wizz Air changed its procedures afterwards.

The one accident that damaged an aircraft was on 8 June 2013. An A320 from Bucharest to Rome Ciampino could not get its left main gear down and locked. The crew tried gravity extension and manoeuvres, then diverted to the longer runway at Fiumicino, shut down the left engine just before touchdown and landed on the partly extended leg. Three people were hurt.

In July 2022, after a bomb threat on a flight from Bari to Kraków, the A321neo diverted to Budapest and passengers left by the emergency slides; some were injured in the evacuation.

Is the Wizz Air fleet safe?

It is new. At 31 December 2025, Wizz Air had 257 Airbus A320-family aircraft with an average age of 4.5 years. Of these, 176 were A321neos and six were long-range A321XLRs. The 69 older A320ceos and A321ceos are leaving the fleet.

The catch is the engine. Wizz Air's neos use Pratt & Whitney GTF engines, and a flaw in powder metal used to make some engine parts means they must be inspected early. At the end of 2025, 33 Wizz Air aircraft were grounded waiting for engines, down from 40 a year earlier. The groundings are the safety system working: the affected engines are taken off before they can fail. Three more aircraft are stuck in Ukraine.

How does the Middle East conflict affect Wizz Air?

Wizz Air flies further east than other European low-cost airlines: to Georgia, Israel, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and the UAE. In late February 2026, it suspended Middle East flights as the regional conflict closed airspace. In September 2026 it began restoring 12 routes, after EASA updated its conflict-zone recommendations.

Airlines do not fly into closed airspace, and EASA's conflict-zone bulletins are the main check. Still, this part of the network carries a risk the rest of Europe does not, and the environment factor reflects it.

How to fly Wizz Air safely

• Watch for schedule changes on Middle East routes. Wizz Air has cancelled at short notice when airspace closed. Keep the app's notifications on.
• Sit where you are assigned. The 2020 Luton event shows that weight and balance matter; if crew ask you to move seats on a quiet flight, there is a reason.
• Keep your belt fastened when seated. On short flights the seat-belt sign and cabin service often overlap.

How we scored it

The accident record (94) is strong, and the fleet (91) averages 4.5 years, against about 10 for Ryanair and 10.9 for easyJet. Incidents (78) lose points for the Prague tail strikeTail strikeWhen the tail of an aircraft touches the runway during take-off or landing, usually because the nose was raised too far or too early.More in the glossary and the Kraków runway event, and the environment (82) for flights near conflict zones. Compare Vueling, whose IOSAIOSAThe IATA Operational Safety Audit, an international audit of an airline's safety management and operations. Every IATA member must pass it.More in the glossary audit Wizz Air does not have.