Air China to order 60 Airbus A320neo aircraft, subject to shareholder approval
If approved, this would mean that Airbus has secured more than 140 orders for A320neo family aircraft in the past few days.
Air China has announced that it has reached an agreement with Airbus for an order of 60 A320neo family aircraft, with the airline still requiring shareholders’ approval to finalize the transaction.
In a filing on the Shanghai Stock Exchange (SSE) on December 30, 2025, Air China disclosed that it had signed an agreement with Airbus covering an order for 60 A320neo family aircraft, with a list price of more than $9.5 billion.
The filing read that “through fair negotiations, Airbus will offer our company a substantial discount based on the list price,” with Air China utilizing its own cash reserves, “commercial bank loans, and other financing methods to fund this transaction.”
The 60 aircraft will be delivered between 2028 and 2032, the Chinese carrier’s filing pointed out.
However, the order still needs to be approved by the airline’s shareholders and the state, which, while it should not be a hurdle for Air China, it still needs to happen for the airline and European planemaker to finalize the order.
Airbus order and delivery filings showed that as of November 30, no undisclosed customer had placed an order for 60 A320neo family aircraft.
Air China’s order came a day after two other Chinese carriers, Juneyao Air and Spring Airlines, filed their own order announcements with the SSE. While both airlines will also have to obtain shareholder approval for their orders, they purchased 25 and 30 A320neo family aircraft, respectively.
The European planemaker still finalized an order from China on December 30, announcing that China Aircraft Leasing Group (CALC) firmed up a deal for 30 A320neo family aircraft, taking the Chinese aircraft lessor’s Airbus order book to 282 units. 203 of those are A320neo family aircraft, the manufacturer highlighted.
And on November 17, Air China Cargo, after having received the go-ahead from its shareholders, confirmed an order for six A350Fs.
Rytis Beresnevicius
While Airbus has continued to sell and deliver aircraft to Chinese carriers, Boeing has not been so successful. The United States-based planemaker, undoubtedly feeling the effects of the trade policies of its government, including the bizarre tariff regime imposed by the current administration, has only secured a total of 49 orders from Chinese airlines between January 2020 and November 2025.
This includes Cathay Pacific buying 14 777X aircraft in August. No other Chinese airline or lessor had ordered Boeing aircraft in 2024 or 2025.
During the summer, rumors were circulating that Chinese airlines could order up to a total of 500 Airbus aircraft, as reported by Bloomberg in August. During the same month, Bloomberg also suggested that the country could finalize an order for up to 500 Boeing aircraft, but it has yet to materialize.
In April, in response to the tariffs imposed by the Trump administration, China prohibited its airlines from taking delivery of Boeing aircraft. The ban was lifted in May, and as of November 30, the planemaker had delivered 60 aircraft to its Chinese customers this year, including 40 deliveries between June and November.
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