Air India planning to offer in-flight Wi-Fi facility on its Airbus A-320 planes

Air India (AI) is planning to offer Wi-Fi services to domestic passengers traveling on its Airbus A-320 planes. If the plan materializes, users will be able to browse the Internet, send and receive emails and even stream YouTube videos while flying at 35,000 ft. above ground. Times of India reports that if AI introduces in-flight Wi-Fi services, other domestic airlines will also follow the suite.

Air India boss Ashwani Lohani said that they are looking to implement the service on their planes and have issued an expression of interest. They'll need a nod from the aircraft manufacturer to install the Wi-Fi equipment on board. While there is no timeline set; it is expected that the services will begin as early as in July this year.


There is no clear information about what speeds and data limits will be set for the users. It is likely that the airline will charge the users some additional money to use the on-board Internet. We'd expect the airlines to offer first five to ten minutes of Internet usage for free and charge money for those who need to use it for longer durations.

JetBlue airlines (USA) offers free wi-fi services to every passenger on board. While there are other airlines that charge as much as $45 ( ~ Rs. 2950) for 6 hours of Internet access. Airlines may even decide on offering few MBs of data for free and charge for the total data consumed.

As of now, none of the airline operators in India offer the service but are actively looking at possibilities of rolling out the service. An interesting point to note as reported by ToI is that the International carriers are allowed to offer Wi-Fi services in Indian air-space only if they have servers on Indian soil. Else, they are required to turn off the service while the plane is flying in Indian air-space.

Source: timesofindia.indiatimes.com