The next oneworld-branded lounge could open in 2026, CEO says

We may only need to wait until 2026 for the next oneworld branded airport lounge to open, according to oneworld CEO Nat Pieper when I spoke to him on Monday as part of Oman Air’s oneworld inauguration event.

The alliance opened its first alliance-branded lounges in early 2024, first in Seoul in January quickly followed by the oneworld Amsterdam lounge which we reviewed here in February.

The oneworld alliance was late to the game of operating its own lounges, with both SkyTeam and Star Alliance operating airline-agnostic lounges for years. Star Alliance was first, opening one in Zurich Airport in 2001 whilst SkyTeam followed with a lounge at Heathrow in 2008, albeit now closed.

Alliance-branded lounges differ from airline lounges in that they are managed by the alliance themselves, rather than being adopted by a particular airline but accept passengers from across all alliance partners.

The idea is that they ‘fill in the gaps’ at airports where multiple alliance airlines fly but where no one airline has a particularly strong foothold to justify its own lounge.

Pieper told me that both passengers and airlines are pleased with the existing two lounges:

“Both lounges have fantastic NPS (Net Promoter) scores. And the true metric of all of that, beyond just what we hear directly from customers, is from some of our premier airlines that historically had different facilities in these airports and have very high standards.

Oman, Qatar, Qantas, British Airways, each of the member airlines has been incredibly pleased with the quality of service, the feedback that they’re getting from their guests. And so we’re on to something here.”

With the existing two lounges now in successful operation for 18 months, I asked if we can expect any more to open in the coming years.

“I think, from our perspective, we want to have another three to five to ten lounges over the next five years. We have a good couple folks within the oneworld team allocated to that task, flying all over the place, meeting with airport authorities.”

One of the issues is getting a space in the first place. In most airports, space is at a premium and there isn’t always a suitable spot in the terminal to build a new lounge.

This can lead to some airports converting space previously used for other purposes into a lounge, such as the new No1 Lounge at Heathrow Terminal 2, which is in a windowless interior space in the heart of the terminal building (although still a decent lounge!).

Another issue highlighted by Pieper is that some airports do not want to give up control of the airport experience to a third party. This is particularly true in India, where “they want to have one big common lounge [for all airlines] run by the airport.”

For now, Pieper says there are that no leases have been signed yet.

So when might we expect the next oneworld lounges?

“Am I going to be cutting a ribbon in the next 30 days? No, but there are a handful of of opportunities that I’m very excited about. You know, it could pop anytime within the next six to 12 months. We’re working it hard.”

Even if a lease is signed tomorrow, airside building work at airports is a complicated process and can face lengthy delays, so I suspect it won’t be until summer 2026, at the earliest, that we might see the third lounge open.