AirAsia celebrates a decade of low cost flights to Perth

AirAsia is celebrating the 10th anniversary of its first service into Perth. AirAsia's long-haul sister airline, AirAsia X, began flying between Perth and Kuala Lumpur in 2008 with six services a week, increasing to a daily service just five months later. The airline now offers a daily service on a 377-seat A330.

Malaysia is Perth Airport's second largest visitor market after the UK. Just last year, Perth welcomed 103,900 Malaysian visitors, injecting more than $218 million into the WA economy.

Perth Airport CEO Kevin Brown said the partnership with AirAsia had helped change the face of travel for many Western Australians.

"AirAsia has been in the vanguard of a low-cost carrier revolution that has delivered more affordable and accessible travel options than ever before," Mr Brown said.

"When AirAsia first entered the Perth market, low-cost carriers made up just four per cent of Perth's international seats.

"Low-cost carriers now make up more than a quarter of Perth Airport's international seats. That means affordable international travel is now a possibility for a much larger section of the WA community.

"But it's also helped bring travellers from Malaysia to Perth, where we have a large Malaysian-Australian community. That's good for tourism and good for WA.

"In its first 10 years, AirAsia has flown nearly 2.8 million passengers to and from Perth, across its network of over 130 destinations and we look forward to that growing over the next decade."

AirAsia X Malaysia CEO Benyamin Ismail said the airline is a pioneer of low-cost travel and is excited to be celebrating 10 years of flying to and from Perth.

"To all our guests, industry partners, Tourism WA and of course Perth Airport - thank you for being part of this milestone," Mr Ismail said.