Batik Air

If you spot in Indonesia, you see the Lion Group everywhere – and still have to sort it out anew every time. Batik Air is the brand that looks least like Lion: no lion on the tail, but a traditional ornament, plus business class on board and a fleet in which Airbus and Boeing fly side by side. Here you learn how to place Batik Air and tell it apart from its many relatives.

Batik Air at a glance

Batik Air is the full-service airline of the Indonesian Lion Group and is based at Jakarta-Soekarno-Hatta Airport. The idea dates from 2011: the group then announced a premium subsidiary, which at first ran under the project name “Space Jet.” In 2012 it was given the name Batik Air – a nod to Indonesian batik, the traditional art of patterning fabric with wax and dye.

Batik Air started its first scheduled flight in May 2013. At launch it borrowed Boeing 737-900ERs from its sister Lion Air and flew from Jakarta to Manado, among other places. That made it Indonesia’s third full-service airline – the best-known representative of this segment is still Garuda Indonesia, whose low-cost subsidiary Citilink competes on the same domestic routes.

Today Batik Air deploys most of its capacity domestically – according to available information, around nine tenths of its seats go to Indonesian routes. That is no coincidence: Indonesia is an island nation with thousands of islands, and many connections that elsewhere go by train or car can only be made here by air.

Codes and callsign

• IATA code ID: appears in the flight number, so on the departure board, in the ticket and in schedules – that is, “ID” plus the flight number.
• ICAO code BTK: appears in the air traffic control flight plan and on flight trackers.
• Callsign BATIK: this is how the crew checks in on the radio.

The IATA code ID happens to fit Indonesia well, but has nothing to do with the country abbreviation – IATA codes are purely airline identifiers. Why flight number and callsign are not the same is explained in the article Callsign vs. flight number. The basics of the two code systems can be found in IATA and ICAO codes explained.

The Lion Group: many brands, one group

Batik Air is only one part of a large airline group. The Lion Group was built up by the brothers Rusdi and Kusnan Kirana and operates several brands with clearly separated roles. For spotters this is the most important context, because many of the aircraft move from one brand to the next over their lifetime.

Airline	Country	IATA / ICAO	Role	Typical aircraft
Lion Air	Indonesia	JT / LNI	Low-cost carrier, largest brand of the group	Boeing 737, Airbus A330
Batik Air	Indonesia	ID / BTK	Full-service with business class	A320, 737-800
Wings Air	Indonesia	IW / WON	Regional traffic	ATR 72
Thai Lion Air	Thailand	SL / TLM	Low-cost carrier in Thailand	Boeing 737-800, 737-900ER
Batik Air Malaysia	Malaysia	OD / MXD	Full-service in Malaysia, formerly Malindo Air	Boeing 737, Airbus A330

You know the principle from European groups that operate several brands for different customer groups. How such strategies work is explained in the background article on airline multi-brand strategies. Another Indonesian airline often associated with the Lion Group is Super Air Jet – formally, however, it stresses its independence.

Batik Air and Batik Air Malaysia

Since April 2022 there have been two airlines with the name Batik. That was when the Malaysian Malindo Air was renamed Batik Air Malaysia. Both airlines belong to the Lion Group, and cooperate through codeshare. Legally and operationally, however, they remain separate: their own codes, their own registrations, their own fleet. Fleet overviews also say that Batik Air’s 737-800s are to be transferred to the Malaysian sister – a typical example of fleet migration within the group.

The fleet: Airbus and Boeing under one brand

Unlike many airlines that rely on a single type, Batik Air flies Airbus and Boeing in parallel. According to fleet overviews (as of mid-2026), the fleet looks roughly like this:

Type	Number (approx.)	Seats	Spotter note
Airbus A320ceo	47	mostly 156 (12 business, 144 economy), also versions with 136 to 164	Backbone of the fleet; some with sharklets, some with small wingtip fences
Airbus A320neo	1	156 (12 business, 144 economy)	One-off – big engines, a real catch
Boeing 737-800	12	162 (12 business, 150 economy)	Classic winglets; to move to Malaysia
Airbus A330-300	1	two classes, 18 business seats in 2-2-2	Only widebody jet, used for pilgrimage flights among others

The basis is the first-generation Airbus A320. In March 2013 the Lion Group had signed a major order in France for 234 aircraft of the A320 family – at the time one of the largest single orders in the history of Airbus. Batik Air then became an important Airbus operator in the group, while Lion Air mostly stayed with Boeing.

The Boeing 737-800 complements the Airbus fleet. The 737-900ERs with which Batik Air began in 2013 no longer play a role. The manufacturer of the 737 is Boeing.

A special one-off is the Airbus A330-300. Batik Air took over its first widebody jet in November 2019 from Thai Lion Air. In December 2019 it flew pilgrims from Surabaya to Medina with it, and in early 2020 the aircraft brought Indonesians back from Wuhan. The group had originally even planned Boeing 787s for Batik Air, but the order was canceled in 2014.

Besides the single A320neo, fleet overviews list further open orders for Batik Air for the A320neo family, including the A321LR. When and in what numbers these aircraft will actually arrive is unclear – better treat forecasts with caution.

A320 or 737-800? How to tell them apart

Because both types wear the same paint scheme, you have to look more closely at Batik Air than at a pure Boeing or Airbus airline. The basic rules:

The guide Telling Airbus and Boeing apart explains in detail how to reliably distinguish the two families; the shapes of the wingtips are shown in Recognizing winglets and sharklets. Within the A320 fleet, A320neo or ceo helps you spot the single neo: its engines are much larger and sit farther forward. On the 737 side, the overview of the 737 generations is worthwhile in case you still run into an older 737-900ER from the group’s stock.

How to recognize Batik Air

The paint is the strongest feature: white fuselage with the “Batik” titles and a dark tail with an ornament in batik style. Where Lion Air shows a stylized lion, Batik Air carries a pattern reminiscent of traditional fabrics. That makes telling them apart within the group easy at first glance – as long as you can see the tail.

It gets trickier with the switch between the Batik airlines. Batik Air Malaysia uses a very similar look. Here the registration decides: Indonesian aircraft carry PK- at the rear, Malaysian ones 9M-. If you are generally enthusiastic about registrations, you will find ideas in the article Collecting registrations.

Business class in a narrowbody jet

What sets Batik Air apart from its sister Lion Air is mostly visible inside. All flights offer two classes. In the A320 and 737-800, there are usually twelve business passengers up front in rows with two seats each on the left and right, followed by economy in the usual 3-3 layout. Meals and snacks are included, and business class has its own screens. In Jakarta-Soekarno-Hatta and Jakarta-Halim, business passengers also have their own lounges available.

For you as a spotter this is only indirectly visible: with usually 156 seats on the A320 and 162 on the 737-800, the seat count is well below the dense seating of pure low-cost carriers. If you collect seat maps or cabin photos, Batik Air is a good example of a full-service product on short routes in Southeast Asia.

Spotting Batik Air

You will not run into Batik Air in Europe – the network ends in Asia, Australia and on the Arabian Peninsula. Your best chances are in Indonesia itself:

• Jakarta-Soekarno-Hatta (CGK): headquarters and most important hub, with a focus on Terminal 2 since late 2022.
• Jakarta-Halim Perdanakusuma (HLP): the capital’s second airport, also with Batik Air traffic.
• Makassar (UPG): second hub on Sulawesi and junction for flights to the east of the country.
• Denpasar on Bali (DPS) and Surabaya (SUB): other focus airports; in 2022 Batik Air announced it would expand its international network from Bali.

Outside Indonesia, Batik Air flies to Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, Bangkok-Don Mueang and Perth, among others. If you are traveling to Southeast Asia anyway, the guide Plane spotting in Singapore and the page on Singapore Changi Airport are a good starting point. There, besides Batik Air, you also see Singapore Airlines and the low-cost subsidiary Scoot. At Kuala Lumpur Airport you in turn meet AirAsia and the Malaysian Batik sister.

Common mix-ups

• Equating Batik Air with Batik Air Malaysia – two airlines, two countries, different codes (ID/BTK versus OD/MXD) and registrations (PK- versus 9M-).
• Taking Batik Air for a low-cost carrier – it is the group’s full-service brand; the low-cost carrier is Lion Air.
• Taking every Lion Group jet for Lion Air – the tail reveals the brand: lion at Lion Air, batik ornament at Batik Air.
• Assuming a pure Airbus fleet – besides the A320s, Boeing 737-800s also fly.
• Overlooking the single A320neo – it wears the same paint as the ceo; watch for the big engines.
• Taking ID for a country code – the IATA code is purely an airline identifier.

Conclusion

Batik Air is the full-service face of the Lion Group: business class on board, a hub in Jakarta and a fleet in which A320s and 737-800s fly under the same paint. For spotters the appeal lies in sorting – the tail helps between Lion Air and Batik Air, the registration between the two Batik airlines, a look at the nose and wingtips between Airbus and Boeing. If you do these three steps cleanly, you end up with an unambiguous entry in your logbook.