Turkey’s Biggest Budget Airline Now Owns the Czech Flag Carrier

Pegasus Airlines has completed its acquisition of Czech Airlines and the Smartwings Group, closing a deal first announced in December 2025. The Turkish low-cost carrier said on October 1 that it had secured every required regulatory approval and met its closing conditions. The transaction, valued at €154 million including the two companies and related receivables, brings one of the oldest airline names in Central Europe under the ownership of a carrier that only switched to a low-cost model in 2005. The combined group now operates more than 175 aircraft, with firm orders for another 140 already on the books.

Passengers flying Smartwings or Czech Airlines should not notice an immediate difference. The companies say both brands will continue to operate under their existing names, with day-to-day operations, customer relationships and service delivery unchanged. Smartwings, which absorbed Czech Airlines in recent years, serves around 80 destinations in 20 countries and has long-standing ties to tour operators selling package holidays from Prague and other Czech and Slovak cities. Pegasus, based in Istanbul, flies to 161 destinations in 57 countries and runs one of the youngest and most fuel-efficient fleets in the industry.

Regulators did ask for one concession. Czech competition authorities required Pegasus to hand a number of summer slots on the Prague to Antalya route to another airline, because the two groups would otherwise have dominated one of the most popular holiday corridors between the Czech Republic and Turkey’s Mediterranean coast. The approval process also ran through Turkey and other countries where the group operates. The deal gives Pegasus a second home market inside the European Union and a ready-made leisure network that would have taken years to build from scratch.

For travelers, the longer-term questions are about networks and fares. The two airlines describe their routes as complementary, which suggests more connections between Central Europe and Turkey and, potentially, onward links through Istanbul’s Sabiha Gökçen airport, Pegasus’s main base. Combined buying power and shared aircraft orders could also help keep costs down, although fewer independent competitors on overlapping routes can work the other way. For now, existing bookings stand as they are, and anyone holding a Smartwings or Czech Airlines ticket should continue to manage it through the airline they booked with.

Sources: AviTrader, TRAVEL Extra