Direct Nice–Toronto flight: Air Canada flies from June 2027

The Côte d’Azur continues to expand its transatlantic route network. Less than a week after the announcement of a daily Nice — New York service, Nice airport gained another US destination: on 3 September 2026 Air Canada announced that from 16 June 2027 it will link the capital of the French Riviera with Toronto. In the summer of 2027 Nice will have direct connections to Canada every day.

How Nice is building its transatlantic routes

Nice Côte d’Azur Airport has long been more than a regional airfield: it is the second busiest passenger airport in France and the leading one outside Paris for long-haul routes. In April 2026 an expanded Terminal 2 was opened — 23,058 additional square metres, six new boarding gates and 36 check-in desks; the site’s capacity increased from 14 to 18 million passengers a year.

Then the routes came one after another. At the end of August 2026 American Airlines announced a daily Nice — New York (JFK) service from 6 May 2027 on the Airbus A321XLR: this will be the airport’s fourth direct link to New York (Nice Premium). A few days later Air Canada announced Toronto — with the new route Nice will have eleven long-haul destinations. The airport had already been talking about adding India as early as June 2026.

Schedule, aircraft and season

The Nice — Toronto service will operate in the summer 2027 season: from 16 June to 23 October, twice a week, on a wide-body Airbus A330-300.

• From Toronto — on Wednesdays and Saturdays: departure at 19:30, arrival in Nice at 09:40 the following morning.
• Return from Nice — departure at 11:10, landing at Pearson Airport at 14:30 the same day.
• Together with the existing Nice — Montreal service this provides the Riviera with daily connections to Canada throughout the summer.

Air Canada has served Nice since 2014 — initially from Montreal, and now from Toronto as well. According to Sabre data cited by Aviation Week, around 117,900 passengers travelled between Canada and Nice in 2025, of whom approximately 31,400 were from Toronto. In other words, the market for a direct service already exists; travellers simply used to fly with connections.

Toronto — not a final destination, but a connecting hub

For Air Canada, Pearson Airport is the main base and its largest hub. The airline’s representative in France, Jean-François Roden, emphasises that Nice gains direct access to two of the carrier’s hubs and, through them, convenient connections to more than 250 destinations in Canada, the US, Latin America and the Caribbean (Invest in Côte d’Azur).

In practice this means that from Nice, with a single connection, travellers can reach Vancouver, Calgary, Chicago, San Francisco, Mexico City and the Caribbean islands — routes for which passengers previously had to travel via Paris, London or Frankfurt.

The Chairman of the Board of Aéroports de la Côte d’Azur, Frank Goldnadel, calls Air Canada a loyal partner since 2014 and says the new route strengthens the region’s connectivity with North America. For the airport it is also a matter of status: the more long-haul routes there are, the less southern France depends on Parisian hubs.

The route’s place in Air Canada’s 2027 plans

Nice is part of the carrier’s large summer programme. For the 2027 season Air Canada has announced several new routes:

• Toronto — Oslo: four flights a week on the Airbus A321XLR from 2 June to 10 October.
• Montreal — Shannon: three flights a week on the A321XLR from 10 June to 2 October.
• Montreal — Basel–Mulhouse: four flights a week from 16 June.
• Montreal — Dubrovnik: three flights a week on the Boeing 787 from 11 May to 23 October.
• Vancouver — Guangzhou: three flights a week year-round from 4 May 2027, subject to regulatory approval.

Toronto — London Heathrow services will operate five times daily in summer 2027. The expansion is supported by a new fleet: narrow-body A321XLRs will take on medium-density routes such as Oslo and Shannon, while wide-body Boeing 787s and A330s will serve dense summer routes, including Nice.

What this means for the Riviera

The direct service works both ways. For residents of the Côte d’Azur it is an opportunity to fly to North America without travelling halfway across France to Paris; for Canadians it is a short route to the sea, Cannes and Monaco at the height of the season. Tour operators will almost certainly assemble package deals around the new timetable, combining Nice with Monaco and Cannes: the Wednesday and Saturday flights fit neatly with both week-long and ten-day holidays.

There is also a consumer nuance: from 2027 the updated European regulation on air passenger rights will be in force — the new rules on delays and compensation apply to transatlantic departures from Nice as well.

And for the city itself long-haul routes are not only about economics. Nice, which was once the winter capital of the European aristocracy, is again becoming a crossroads for long-distance routes: in summer 2027 Toronto will be added to New York, Montreal and Dubai.

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