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easyJet is a budget airline that sells cheap flights point-to-point across Europe.
easyJet is a no-frills airline that flies people around Europe. It sells seats on short trips — London to Barcelona, Berlin to Rome, and hundreds of other routes — and its customers are mostly holidaymakers and people visiting family, plus some business travellers. It makes money from ticket sales, but a big chunk also comes from extras: checked bags, seat selection, food, and higher-fare bundles. Because it flies point-to-point (no connections through a hub), planes turn around fast and spend more time earning money in the air. It is headquartered in Luton, near London, and its main base is London Gatwick.
Think of it as a bus service with wings: cheap base fare, then charge for the luggage and the window seat. That model means costs matter more than anything. easyJet keeps costs low with one plane family (Airbus A320s), dense seating, and lots of direct online bookings rather than travel agents. Roughly speaking, a bit over half of revenue comes from fares and the rest from those add-on "ancillaries." It also runs easyJet holidays, a package-tour business that bundles flights with hotels, which is small but growing fast and earns higher margins than just selling seats.
The business is famously cyclical: when the economy is good and people feel like travelling, planes fill up and profits soar; when fuel prices spike, strikes hit, or a pandemic grounds fleets, losses pile up quickly. easyJet was founded in 1995 by Stelios Haji-Ioannou and grew by grabbing routes from expensive flag carriers. Today it competes hard with Ryanair, Wizz Air, and British Airways on the same short-haul routes. When it has spare cash, it tends to reinvest in new planes and its holiday arm, pay down aircraft debt, and occasionally buy back shares — but the airline industry's thin margins mean cash flow is rarely as steady as it looks.
Saved answer · last researched 11 Oct 2026