Cancelled
1.1%
1.0 pts better than average
Sunshine Coast to Sydney
MCY → SYD · 837 km · 230 flights a month · Sydney to Sunshine Coast
On time (departures)
71.4%
national 78.2%
Flight time
1h 45m
10m longer than the return
Latest month
0.4%
Jul 2026 cancelled
Airlines
4
on this direction
Punctuality: 12 months to Jul 2026
Flights between Sunshine Coast and Sydney carried 58,682 passengers in both directions in Jun 2026, ranking 21st of the 62 routes with reported traffic that month. Over the 12 months to Jul 2026, 1.1% of flights from Sunshine Coast to Sydney were cancelled, well below the national average of 2.1%. Which airline you fly matters: QantasLink cancelled 2.1% of its flights in this direction, while Qantas cancelled none. Direction matters here: Sydney→Sunshine Coast departs on time 76.2% of the time against 71.4% coming back. Traffic now runs 19% above its 2019 average. The route is busiest in January and quietest in February.
The route
837 km great-circle · 1h 45m typical
Punctuality by airline
12 months to Jul 2026. Qantas and QantasLink are reported separately in the source data and are shown that way here — on many routes the difference between them is large.
| Airline | Group | Flights | Cancelled | On time |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jetstar | 1,133 | 1.3% | 75.9% | |
| Virgin Australia | Virgin Australia Group | 791 | 0.4% | 69.2% |
| QantasLink | Qantas Group | 574 | 2.1% | 62.5% |
| Qantas | Qantas Group | 259 | 0.0% | 78.4% |
Does the direction matter?
On this route it does. Delays build up through the day, so the aircraft flying the return leg is often already behind schedule. Cancellations, by contrast, usually take out both legs — which is why those figures barely differ.
| Direction | On time | Cancelled | Flights |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sunshine Coast → Sydney | 71.4% | 1.1% | 2,757 |
| Sydney → Sunshine Coast | 76.2% | 0.8% | 2,755 |
A 4.8 point gap in on-time departures · 12 months to Jul 2026
Cancellations over time
Punctuality data begins Nov 2003 and runs to Jul 2026. Gaps are months with no reported services, not missing data.
Passengers, 1984 to 2026
Traffic: to Jun 2026 · Marks show industry events
Passenger figures count both directions together — Sunshine Coast to Sydney and back. The published statistics do not separate them. Cancellations, punctuality and flight numbers above are for Sunshine Coast to Sydney only.
When is this route busiest?
Average passengers by calendar month, relative to the annual average. 2020 and 2021 are excluded — those years were a structural break, not a season, and leaving them in shifts the apparent peak month on most routes. Higher months are typically the more expensive ones to fly.
Both directions combined, as published.
How long is the flight?
Scheduled flight time from Sunshine Coast to Sydney is 1h 45m gate to gate, over 837 km. The return leg is scheduled at 1h 35m — the two directions differ by 10m, so this way round is the slower one.
This is scheduled block time — from leaving the gate to reaching it at the other end — not time in the air, and not a substitute for checking your own booking. It is a median across the flights currently timetabled on this leg.
Flight numbers on this route
9 flight numbers currently scheduled from Sunshine Coast to Sydney. These are the numbers you book under — some are operated by a regional partner such as QantasLink or Alliance.
Typical flight time 1h 45m.
Scheduled every day this week — 51 departures in all.
Jetstar · 3 · Airbus A320, Airbus A320 NEO
JQ785 · JQ787 · JQ789
Qantas · 3 · Airbus A220-300
QF1577 · QF1579 · QF1581
Virgin Australia · 3 · Boeing 737-800
VA488 · VA492 · VA496
Current timetable as at 2026-09-06
Timetables change; these are not a booking source and carry no punctuality figures of their own. The cancellation and on-time rates above are for the route as a whole, not for any single flight number — per-flight performance is not collected.
The route in numbers
| Busiest month on record | 81,503 · Jan 2026 |
| Pandemic low | 1,231 · Jul 2021 |
| Traffic vs 2019 average | 119.3% |
| Load factor, Jun 2026 | 82.6% |
| Aircraft trips, Jun 2026 | 422 |
| Great-circle distance | 837 km |
Traffic: to Jun 2026