How Wizz Air became the second-largest airline in Italy

This week, Wizz Air opened its seventh Italian base. The first aircraft arrived in Turin on 14 September and a second follows on 25 October. From Turin, the airline now flies 23 routes to 10 countries, with around 1.3 million seats on sale in 2026.

If you have flown Wizz Air this year, you may well have read one of our many stories on Italy in WIZZ magazine. It has been a big year for the airline in Italy, and the August–September issue celebrates this with a beautifully shot story about an ancient pilgrimage route in Palermo. The feature also marks the Palermo base Wizz Air opened on 3 August. When an airline commits aircraft, crews and routes to a city, thousands of people who have never been there are about to fly in with our magazine in the seat pocket. And we’re here to tell them all about the destination before they land.

But how did Wizz Air’s Italian story start? Its first Italian flight took off from Milan Bergamo to Katowice in May 2004. Until 2020, Italy was a destination on the western edge of a network built around Central and Eastern Europe, with no Wizz Air aircraft based there.

The pandemic changed that. While much of the industry was shrinking, Wizz Air had cash in the bank and new A321neos arriving, and it decided Italy was a market worth investing in. In July 2020 it opened its first Italian base at Milan Malpensa. Catania, Palermo and Bari followed within a year, then Rome Fiumicino in July 2021, and the airline began flying domestic routes between Italian cities.

This growth has continued. Wizz Air flew more than 21 million passengers in Italy in 2025, up 8%, and passed 100 million Italian passengers since 2004. The airline says it now holds around 11% of the market, making it Italy’s second-largest carrier.

Alongside the aircraft, Wizz Air is putting money into Italian sport. In December 2025 it announced a partnership with AS Roma, its first football sponsorship, which puts its name on the team’s shirt sleeves and has it flying the squad to away games.

Running is the airline’s other big sporting commitment, and Italy hosted three of the nine Wizz Air running events last year. The airline is title sponsor of the Milano Marathon, the Rome Half Marathon and the Venice Marathon, whose 40th edition on 25 October sold out three months early with 23,000 entries.

Italy’s airports handled 229.7 million passengers in 2025, according to ENAC, Italy’s civil aviation authority. International traffic grew 8% to 157.2 million, and low-cost airlines carried 63% of all passengers.

The effect reaches well beyond the airport. Foreign visitors spent close to €57 billion in Italy in 2025, according to the Bank of Italy. Using Wizz Air’s passenger numbers, its route mix and Bank of Italy data on how much visitors spend per trip, we estimate that people flying into Italy on Wizz Air spend around €3 billion a year once they land. That money goes on hotel rooms, restaurant bills, museum tickets and taxis in Rome and Milan, and increasingly in Naples, Catania, Palermo and now Turin.

At LXM Media, we have seen that growth reflected in demand from Italian brands. The number of Italian advertisers in WIZZ magazine has risen by 130% in the last 12 months, and our contributors on the ground are sending us more stories from Italy than ever. For Italian brands, Wizz Air’s growth in Italy represents an increasingly powerful opportunity to connect with millions of travellers at every stage of their journey. Get in touch with us now to find out how to reach them.