MIAT Mongolian Airlines

An aircraft with a JU registration in the sky over Frankfurt – for many spotters, that is one of those moments that make the waiting worthwhile. MIAT Mongolian Airlines is one of the smaller flag carriers that regularly come to Germany. Because the whole fleet fits in a few lines, every sighting quickly becomes a collector’s item. Here you learn who MIAT is, which aircraft the airline flies and how to catch the Mongolian Boeing 787 in Frankfurt.

MIAT at a glance

MIAT Mongolian Airlines is Mongolia’s state-owned airline, headquartered in Ulaanbaatar. It flies domestically to provincial cities, within Asia to China, Japan, South Korea and Hong Kong, among others, and long haul to Europe – with Frankfurt as its destination in Germany and Istanbul as the second major European destination.

For a long time, the company was known only by the abbreviation MIAT, which goes back to its Mongolian name. Only in the mid-2000s was “Mongolian Airlines” added to the name for marketing reasons. MIAT belongs to no alliance. Instead, the airline works through codeshares with individual partners, including Korean Air, Turkish Airlines, Japan Airlines, Cathay Pacific and Air China.

Codes and callsign

• IATA code OM: appears in the flight number, so on the departure board and the ticket – in Frankfurt, for example, as OM137 or OM138.
• ICAO code MGL: appears in the flight plan filed with air traffic control and on most flight trackers.
• Callsign MONGOL AIR: this is how the crew identifies itself on the radio.

At first glance, the IATA code OM seems arbitrary – it has nothing to do with the country’s name. The ICAO code MGL is catchier, clearly recalling “Mongolia.” If you filter for the airline on the tracker, MGL is therefore the better search term.

History: from the An-2 to the 787

MIAT’s history begins in July 1956. With the support of the Soviet Union and Aeroflot, the company started flight operations, and the first scheduled flight went from Ulaanbaatar to Irkutsk in Siberia. In the first decades, the fleet consisted of Soviet-built propeller aircraft, including the Antonov An-2, the Ilyushin Il-14 and, from 1964, the Antonov An-24. The An-26 was added later. The airline was closely tied to the military at the time.

The step into the international jet age followed in 1987: with a Tupolev Tu-154B leased from Aeroflot, MIAT flew regularly to Moscow, Irkutsk and Beijing. After the political upheaval in Mongolia, the airline’s direction changed markedly. In 1992, MIAT received a Boeing 727-200 as a gift from the head of the Hanjin Group, which also includes Korean Air. In 1993, the civil business was separated from the military as an independent state-owned enterprise.

In the 1990s the network grew: besides Seoul, Berlin and Osaka were added in 1996. In 1998, MIAT took over its first Airbus aircraft with a leased Airbus A310, and in 2002 its first Boeing 737 – the same year the connection to Tokyo started. In 2011 came two leased Boeing 767-300ERs. With them, routes that previously needed stopovers could be flown directly, and MIAT introduced a new look. The A310 left the fleet in the following years.

In more recent times, too, MIAT wrote small chapters of aviation history. In June 2020, the airline flew nonstop from Ulaanbaatar to Seattle – a special flight to bring stranded compatriots home. In October 2022, MIAT was the first airline to fly a Boeing 737 MAX to China again after the worldwide grounding of 2019.

The fleet: small and almost all Boeing

MIAT’s fleet is so manageable that you can write it down on a slip of paper. According to fleet overviews, it looked like this at the end of 2025:

Type	Number	Use	Spotter note
Boeing 787-9	2	Long haul, including Frankfurt, Istanbul, Seoul	The aircraft you are most likely to see in Germany
Boeing 767-300ER	1	Medium and long haul	Oldest widebody, retirement planned
Boeing 737-800	3	Asian routes	737 of the Next Generation series
Boeing 737 MAX 8	1	Asian routes	More MAX aircraft are on order
Bombardier CRJ700	2	Domestic flights	Regional jet, hardly seen outside Mongolia
Boeing 757-200 (freighter)	1	Cargo	Converted passenger jet

The Boeing 787-9 is the flagship. MIAT took delivery of the first aircraft in August 2023, with the second following in 2024. The two Dreamliners were initially planned mainly for the routes to Frankfurt, Istanbul and Seoul. According to fleet overviews, one of the two aircraft has meanwhile been leased to another airline. The remaining Boeing 767-300ER is thus the oldest widebody in the fleet; its retirement is planned.

On the Asian routes, the Boeing 737-800 and the 737 MAX 8 fly. Domestically, the regional jet Bombardier CRJ700 supplements the fleet: MIAT resumed domestic service in 2023, and the first CRJ700 joined in April 2024 under the brand “MIAT Regional.” The manufacturer of the other types is Boeing – an Airbus is no longer part of the fleet today.

787-9 or 767-300ER? How to tell them apart

Both widebody jets wear the MIAT livery and have two engines. Even so, they are easy to separate – especially if you look at the nose, wings and engines.

If you want to reliably tell the 787 from other widebody jets, the article Telling the Boeing 777 and 787 apart offers further features. The 787-9, by the way, is the middle length of the Dreamliner family – between the shorter 787-8 and the longer 787-10.

How to recognize MIAT

The most important feature is the “MIAT” title on the fuselage, with the addition “Mongolian Airlines.” Today’s look dates back to 2011, when MIAT introduced a new corporate design with the first 767-300ERs.

The registration is almost even more unambiguous. Aircraft from Mongolia carry the nationality mark JU-, followed by digits. Such a prefix is so rare in Central Europe that it jumps out at you as you look through photos. More on the system of nationality marks is explained in the article Understanding aircraft registrations.

Spotting MIAT in Frankfurt

In Germany, Frankfurt is MIAT’s destination. The flights run under the numbers OM137 and OM138. How often they operate and at what time changes with the schedule periods – in October 2026, for example, MIAT adjusted the times of the Friday and Sunday flights. So take a quick look at the airport’s current schedule or a flight tracker shortly before your trip.

For the photo itself, you don’t need any insider tips. The Zeppelinheim viewing platform is a proven choice. Whether it fits depends on the runway direction in use and the sun position. The guide Plane spotting at Frankfurt Airport offers an overview of all the options.

Because MIAT has only two 787-9s in the fleet and one of them is leased out according to fleet overviews, a different type may occasionally turn up on the Frankfurt route. If you want both registrations in your hangar, you therefore need patience and several visits. That is exactly what makes MIAT a typical candidate for the list of rare aircraft. You can put your sighting in context with the article How rare is my sighting?.

The hub: Chinggis Khaan International Airport

Since July 2021, MIAT has departed from Chinggis Khaan International Airport (IATA UBN). It lies about 52 kilometers south of Ulaanbaatar in the Khöshig Valley and replaces the old Buyant-Ukhaa Airport. The latter was located near the city between two mountains, which restricted use of the runway and made operations weather-sensitive. The new airport has a single concrete runway (11/29) that is 3,600 meters long – sufficient for widebody jets on long haul. MIAT itself operated the first scheduled flight at the new airport: with a Boeing 737 to Tokyo Narita.

From here, MIAT regularly flies to Frankfurt, Tokyo Narita, Seoul Incheon, Beijing, Istanbul and Hong Kong, among others. Seasonally, destinations like Bangkok, Singapore, Osaka and Ho Chi Minh City are added. In East Asia, you therefore run into MIAT more often than in Europe – for example when plane spotting in Tokyo.

Common mix-ups

• Assuming every 787-9 with an Asian destination is MIAT – the type is widespread, and what matters are the title and the JU registration.
• Reading OM as the code of Mongolia – the IATA code is purely an airline identifier; on the tracker, MGL helps.
• Assuming MIAT is an alliance member – the airline works only through codeshares with individual partners.
• Using the old airport code – since 2021 UBN is the hub, no longer Buyant-Ukhaa.
• Taking over old spotter reports unchecked – with so few aircraft, deployment and schedule change quickly.

Conclusion

MIAT Mongolian Airlines is small but steeped in history: from Soviet propeller aircraft through the Tu-154, Boeing 727 and Airbus A310 to today’s Boeing fleet with two 787-9s. For spotters in Germany, that means a manageable but rewarding task. If you keep an eye on the Frankfurt schedule, the tracker and registrations, the JU prefix gets you one of the rarer sightings at Germany’s largest airport.