Maximise your Avios, air miles and hotel points

Virgin Atlantic (re)launching flights to Toronto in 2025

Links on Head for Points may support the site by paying a commission.  See here for all partner links.

For the first time in over a decade, Virgin Atlantic will operate to Canada. Flights to Toronto launch on 30th March 2025.

Richard Branson joked that this was “third time lucky” for the airline which celebrated its 40th anniversary with a party in Las Vegas last night.

But according to Shai Weiss, CEO of Virgin Atlantic, “this time is different.”

Virgin Atlantic returns to Toronto

“We had Toronto, which was launched just pre-9/11 which was not a really good time to do so. But the difference with Toronto this time is that our Indian network is so strong that it can provide connectivity for Indian nationals. Toronto happens to be the eighth largest centre for Indian diaspora in the world. So it makes a lot of sense.”

India has become a huge market for Virgin Atlantic since it re-launched flights to the country in 2019. From late October, when Virgin adds a second daily flight to Mumbai (in addition to flights to Bengaluru and Delhi) it will offer over a million seats to the country per year.

Virgin Atlantic will face competition, and not just from the usual suspects. Air Canada already operates flights to Mumbai via London and will switch to Delhi this winter.

That didn’t faze Chief Commercial Officer Juha Jarvinen, who said “There’s plenty of competition on the route, but there’s also plenty of people travelling. There’s 1.5 million people travelling between London and Toronto every year.”

To underpin the new route, Virgin Atlantic is also launching a codeshare arrangement with Canadian airline WestJet in October 2024. This will allow Virgin to sell connections via Toronto to other Canadian cities including Calgary, Ottawa and Winnipeg. Reciprocal frequent flyer benefits will follow “in 2025”.

The route will also get support from being included in the Delta / Air France / KLM transatlantic joint venture agreement, which effectively shares the financial risk – and rewards – across the partners.

When will Virgin Atlantic’s Toronto flights operate?

Virgin Atlantic’s new Toronto service will operate daily, with a relatively late departure from Heathrow. The good news is that this means the Clubhouse lounge will be less busy than during the morning rush of flights to North America.

  • VS147 departs Heathrow at 17:10 and arrives in Toronto Pearson Airport at 20:30 the same day
  • VS148 departs Toronto at 22:20 and lands into Heathrow at 10:30 the following morning

The flights will be operated by a mixture of aircraft including Virgin’s latest fleet addition, the A330neo.

Tickets go on sale a week on Wednesday, on 19th June. This is for both cash and points redemptions.

As a reminder, on every flight Virgin Atlantic guarantees to opens up for Virgin Points on the first day of booking:

  • 2 x Upper Class seats
  • 2 x Premium Economy seats
  • 8 x Economy seats

…. although additional seats are likely to be added later.

With reservations available up to 331 days in advance, this should mean that bookings will open up on 19th June for flights from 30th March until mid-May 2025. Be ready to book if you fancy Easter 2025 in Canada.

Tickets go on sale on the Virgin Atlantic website on 19th June.

PS. If you are not a regular Head for Points visitor, why not sign up for our FREE weekly or daily newsletters? They are full of the latest Avios, airline, hotel and credit card points news and will help you travel better. To join our 65,000 free subscribers, click the button below or visit this page of the site to find out more. Thank you.

How to earn Virgin Points from UK credit cards

How to earn Virgin Points from UK credit cards (April 2025)

As a reminder, there are various ways of earning Virgin Points from UK credit cards.  Many cards also have generous sign-up bonuses.

You can choose from two official Virgin Atlantic credit cards (apply here, the Reward+ card has a bonus of 18,000 Virgin Points and the free card has a bonus of 3,000 Virgin Points):

Virgin Atlantic Reward+ Mastercard

18,000 bonus points and 1.5 points for every £1 you spend Read our full review

Virgin Atlantic Reward Mastercard

3,000 bonus points, no fee and 1 point for every £1 you spend Read our full review

You can also earn Virgin Points from various American Express cards – and these have sign-up bonuses too.

American Express Preferred Rewards Gold is FREE for a year and comes with 20,000 Membership Rewards points, which convert into 20,000 Virgin Points.

SPECIAL OFFER: Until 27th May 2025, the sign-up bonus on the ‘free for a year’ American Express Preferred Rewards Gold card is increased from 20,000 Membership Rewards points to 30,000 points. Points convert 1:1 into Avios (30,000 Avios!) and many other programmes. Some people may see even higher personalised offers. Click here to apply.

American Express Preferred Rewards Gold

Your best beginner’s card – 30,000 points, FREE for a year & four airport lounge passes Read our full review

The Platinum Card from American Express comes with 50,000 Membership Rewards points, which convert into 50,000 Virgin Points.

SPECIAL OFFER: Until 27th May 2025, the sign-up bonus on American Express Platinum is increased from 50,000 Membership Rewards points to a huge 80,000 points. Points convert 1:1 into Avios (80,000 Avios!) and many other programmes. Some people may see even higher personalised offers. Click here to apply.

The Platinum Card from American Express

80,000 bonus points and great travel benefits – for a large fee Read our full review

Small business owners should consider the two American Express Business cards. Points convert at 1:1 into Virgin Points.

American Express Business Platinum

50,000 points when you sign-up and an annual £200 Amex Travel credit Read our full review

American Express Business Gold

20,000 points sign-up bonus and FREE for a year Read our full review

Click here to read our detailed summary of all UK credit cards which earn Virgin Points. 

Category

Virgin Atlantic and Flying Club

Comments (48)

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

  • BJ says:
    11 Jun11 June 06:23

    Virgin network and more specifically changes to it are hardly a joking matter. Any news on South Korea? Are they going to try Brazil again? Which existing route is next for the chop?

    • BA Flyer IHG Stayer says:
      11 Jun11 June 06:51

      I understand Seoul is awaiting regulatory approval of the Korean Air and Asiana merger.

      • BJ says:
        11 Jun11 June 12:42

        Undecided on whether to wait for it or just go to India. If Black Friday promotional rewards are as good again this year I’ll probably just take India Autumn 25.

  • TooPoorToBeHere says:
    11 Jun11 June 07:11

    Do we reckon they’ll cancel it before it’s ever flown, or operate it for a few weeks before cancelling it?

  • RJ says:
    11 Jun11 June 07:22

    What do we think the points cost will be for PY/J redemptions to YYZ?

    Hopefully the surcharges aren’t as bad as US redemptions.

  • Grammer says:
    11 Jun11 June 07:22

    Does this mean we’ll be able to redeem virgin points on WestJet?

  • AJA says:
    11 Jun11 June 07:32

    I think you mean faze in this phrase: “That didn’t phase Chief Commercial ”

    To faze is to disturb, bother, or embarrass, but a phase is a stage or step

    • inizii says:
      11 Jun11 June 07:58

      I thought it was just me that got perturbed about such matters – like discrete vs discreet :-).

      • AJA says:
        11 Jun11 June 09:51

        I always correct the Grauniad if I see an error like that and comments are open.

        It just jars with me. Am less bothered by Americanisms creeping in as language is always evolving but I detest obvious misuse of words.

        I do it not as a criticism, more of a correction as I think we are never too old to learn.

        The English language is wonderful and I love the way the same word can have a completely opposite meaning just from the context of a sentence. For example, I’ve used the word wonderful in this paragraph to mean fantastic or great. But consider the meaning of the word in this sentence: On hearing that his flight had just been cancelled and he is now stranded the passenger exclaimed “that’s wonderful! What am I going to do now?”

        • VSCXFAN says:
          11 Jun11 June 10:43

          Presumably, in my 70’s, I’m not too old to learn that a sentence (allegedly) can begin with “But” and a colon be followed by a capital “O”. Perhaps AJA could publish a book on the subject – to while away the hours waiting for the BA Gold Line to pick up the phone….

    • Panda Mick says:
      11 Jun11 June 09:57

      I’d suggest HFP invest in Grammarly at the very least. I stopped reading loyaltylobby, partly because of the lazy journalism (but also because superlatives reign supreme).

  • Tiger says:
    11 Jun11 June 07:48

    VS should have launched Vancouver when they had the Pakistan flights … they would have hoovered up the Indian Separatists market

  • Boi says:
    11 Jun11 June 08:06

    Westjet is the worst airline in Canada! it is often referred to as worstjet.

  • r* says:
    11 Jun11 June 10:29

    More routes that arent north america would be better.

    • No longer Entitled says:
      11 Jun11 June 10:51

      They are called Virgin Atlantic for a reason.

    • roberto says:
      11 Jun11 June 10:54

      VS need flights under 10 hours ideally so as they can turn in around and be back into LHR or MAN for the next rotation the next day.

      The problems are that LH routes inside that 10 hour max flying time are pretty thin. You’re looking at N America, the Middle East , The Caribbean and India(ish)..

      The next criteria is where do customers want to fly to? They need to be able to fill a plane both ways to make it work AND they need connection opportunities.

      Lastly is there already flights going there and can they muscle in onto those destinations. South and Central America for example is rich with opportunities but other carriers have got those routes sown up , Iberia for example seem to pick up a lot of the Hispanic speaking countries.

      But yes , VS have basically become a North American airline. I appreciate that’s not all they do but like you , that’s my impression too.

      • VSCXFAN says:
        11 Jun11 June 11:21

        Flights >10 hours to/from LHR hub were/still are key to VS longterm competitiveness and not only TATL (eg LAX,LAS,SFO,SEA,YVR) but in African & Asian business and premium leisure destinations (eg CPT,GRU,JNB, MLE,MRU,HKG,NRT) – even when the plane spent 10 expensive hours on the ground in JNB! Flights <10 hours to/from eg LOS,TLV,YYZ are also crucial to exploiting LHR connectivity.

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

New to Head for Points?

Welcome!  We’re the UK’s most-read source of business travel, Avios, frequent flyer and hotel loyalty news. Let us improve how you travel. Got any questions? Ask them in our forums.

Get 25,000 Avios with the Barclaycard Avios Plus Mastercard

GET A SIGN-UP BONUS OF 18,000 VIRGIN POINTS!

Latest Forum Posts

Get 80,000 bonus points (worth 80,000 Avios) and £400 of dining credit with The Platinum Card (Offer ends 27th May)

Check reward flight availability instantly for free!

See a whole year of reward seat availability on one page at SeatSpy.com

Get up to 10,000 bonus Hilton Honors points

Booking a luxury hotel?

Our luxury hotel booking service offers you GUARANTEED extra benefits over booking direct. Works with Four Seasons, Mandarin Oriental, The Ritz Carlton, St Regis and more. We've booked £1.7 million of rooms to date. Click for details.

SME? GET THE ONLY FREE SMALL BUSINESS CREDIT CARD WHICH CAN EARN AVIOS

Get points worth 30,000 Avios with 'first year free' American Express Gold (ends 27th May)

The UK's biggest frequent flyer website uses cookies, which you can block via your browser settings. Continuing implies your consent to this policy. Our privacy policy is here.

Got it!