TUI Airways

When a blue-and-white TUI 737 taxis past you in Mallorca or Lanzarote, you as a German spotter probably think of TUIfly first. Quite often you would be wrong: the biggest airline in the TUI family comes from Britain. TUI Airways flies the same design, but with its own registrations, its own codes – and on long-haul routes with the Boeing 787-8 and 787-9. This page shows you how to reliably recognize the British carrier and what is behind codes like BY and TOM.

TUI Airways at a glance

TUI Airways is the British leisure airline of the TUI Group. The airline is headquartered at Wigmore House, right at London Luton Airport, and flies mainly for the group’s tour operators – that is, package vacationers from British airports to the Mediterranean, the Canary Islands and long-haul destinations. Measured by passengers, it is one of the big airlines in the UK; in 2024 it carried around twelve million passengers.

Unlike a classic leisure airline with a single home base, TUI Airways spreads its fleet across many British airports. The major bases include London Gatwick, Manchester and Birmingham, plus Bristol, East Midlands, Glasgow and Newcastle, among others.

TUI Airways belongs to no alliance. Within the group it is one of five airlines: together with the German TUIfly, TUI fly Belgium, TUI fly Netherlands and TUI fly Nordic, it makes up the travel group’s airline family. According to the TUI Group, these companies fly around 125 aircraft in total – the British one accounts for by far the largest share.

From Britannia via Thomson to TUI

The history of TUI Airways is a piece of British charter flying history, and it also explains the unusual codes.

Codes and callsign

• IATA code BY: appears in the flight number, so on the departure board, in the itinerary and on the ticket. The code still dates from the Britannia era.
• ICAO code TOM: appears in the air traffic control flight plan and on flight trackers – a legacy of Thomson.
• Callsign TOMJET: this is how the crew identifies itself on the radio. With the rebranding, it replaced the earlier callsign “TOMSON”.

That is handy for spotters: across the TUI airlines the paint looks almost identical, but the codes differ clearly. TUIfly uses X3 and TUI, TUI fly Belgium TB and JAF, TUI fly Netherlands OR and TFL. How IATA and ICAO codes work in general is explained in the article IATA and ICAO codes explained, and you can find the difference between flight number and callsign in Callsign vs. flight number.

The fleet: Boeing 737 and Boeing 787

TUI Airways flies Boeing exclusively. According to fleet overviews from summer 2025, the fleet looked like this; more 737 MAX 8s have been added since, and older 737-800s are gradually being replaced. The numbers should therefore be seen as a snapshot.

Type	Number (as of 2025)	Seats	Use	Spotter note
Boeing 737-800	just over 30	189	Short and medium haul	Older generation, being retired step by step
Boeing 737 MAX 8	almost 30, more delivered	–	Short and medium haul	Growing share, including 14 leased MAXs from BOC Aviation for 2025/26
Boeing 787-8	8	around 300 to 325	Long haul	Shorter Dreamliner version
Boeing 787-9	5	345	Long haul	Longer version, otherwise found in the group only occasionally at TUI fly Nordic
Boeing 737 MAX 10	on order	still open	–	Delivery depends on certification

The Boeing 737-800 was the backbone for many years; now the Boeing 737 MAX 8 is taking over more and more routes. According to the TUI Group, the first MAX 8 in the TUI group arrived in January 2018. For long-haul, TUI Airways relies on the Boeing 787-8 and the longer Boeing 787-9. On board, there is a premium cabin in addition to economy.

What has disappeared is interesting for your logbook. The Boeing 757-200 was long a typical Thomson aircraft, and the Boeing 767-300ER flew until November 2023 – TUI Airways was the last British passenger airline with this type. In summer 2023, leased Airbus A320s also stepped in because MAX deliveries had been delayed. If you caught an Airbus with a TUI flight number back then, you have a real curiosity in your archive.

787-8 or 787-9? How to tell them apart

Both Dreamliners wear the same design, have the same serrated engine nacelles and the typically swept wings. The difference lies mainly in the length.

On approach, length is hard to judge without a comparison. The most reliable clue is therefore the ICAO type code on the tracker combined with the registration. If you see a Dreamliner in TUI colors, a second look is worthwhile anyway: with G- it is TUI Airways, with PH- the Dutch sister and with SE- the Swedish one. Because the group moves aircraft between its airlines, for example after the end of the Belgian long-haul operation, a Dreamliner may already have carried several registrations.

How to recognize TUI Airways

Since the rebranding, TUI Airways flies in the TUI Group’s group design: white fuselage with blue accents, the red smile logo and the “TUI” titles. Before that, as Thomson Airways, the fleet wore the “Dynamic Wave” livery introduced in 2012.

Because all five TUI airlines look nearly the same, the registration is your most important tool:

Airline	Country	Registration	Types
TUI Airways	United Kingdom	G-	737-800, 737 MAX 8, 787-8, 787-9
TUIfly	Germany	D-	737-800, 737 MAX 8
TUI fly Belgium	Belgium	OO-	737, Embraer E195-E2
TUI fly Netherlands	Netherlands	PH-	737 MAX 8, 787-8
TUI fly Nordic	Sweden	SE-	737 MAX 8, 787-9

How country prefixes work and why G- stands for the United Kingdom is explained in the article on aircraft country codes. Understanding aircraft registrations shows you how to read a registration in detail.

Spotting TUI Airways

In Germany, TUI Airways is a rarity, because the airline flies vacationers from British airports. Your best chances are therefore at two kinds of places.

In the UK itself. Manchester is one of the most important bases, and the Runway Visitor Park at Manchester Airport is a classic for spotters. On a summer day you see TUI 737s and Dreamliners there alongside Jet2, easyJet and long-haul traffic. Gatwick and Birmingham are further TUI focus points. At London’s Heathrow hub, where British Airways dominates, TUI Airways plays no role.

At vacation airports. British leisure airlines land in large numbers in Mallorca, the Canary Islands or on the Greek islands. At Palma de Mallorca Airport, TUI Airways and TUIfly often stand only a few positions apart – ideal for practicing the registration rule. On Lanzarote, the beach at Playa Honda is a popular place to photograph approaches from up close. You can find more worthwhile destinations in the overview of the best spotting spots in Europe.

Common mix-ups

• Taking every TUI 737 for TUIfly – the design is the same, but the G- on the tail belongs to TUI Airways.
• Taking BY for Belarus or Britannia – BY is simply TUI Airways’ IATA code today, even though it dates from the Britannia era.
• Overlooking TOM on the tracker – if you filter only for “TUI”, you find the German flights but not the British ones.
• Taking every TUI Dreamliner for British – TUI fly Netherlands also flies the 787-8, and TUI fly Nordic has a 787-9. Only the G- is unambiguous.
• Taking Thomson and TUI for two airlines – Thomson Airways is the former name of the same company.
• Logging Fly4 aircraft as TUI Airways – in summer, wet-lease 737s also fly under BY flight numbers. Always log the actual operator at the time of the sighting.

Conclusion

TUI Airways is the underrated giant of the TUI family. Behind the familiar smile logo is a British airline with its own history, its own codes and the group’s largest Dreamliner fleet. If you watch for the G- on the tail and the TOM on the tracker on vacation, you turn a supposed TUIfly sighting into a clean entry in your logbook.