Xian Lhasa Flight Experience (Tips, Photos & Map)

Plan your Lhasa Tour from Xian? At the time of writing, three daily flights connect Xian and Lhasa which are operated by Eastern China Airlines and Sichuan Airlines respectively.

The two daily flights by Eastern China Airlines are direct flights taking 3 hours and five minutes while the only daily flight by Sichuan Airlines is an indirect flight with one stopover at Xining ( the capital city of Qinghai Province) taking 4 hours and 50 minutes.

Timetable for the daily three Xian – Lhasa flights

Xian Lhasa MU2333 07:45 – 10:55 ( Eastern China Airlines )
Xian Lhasa 3U8687 7:50 – 12:40 ( Sichuan Airlines )
Xian Lhasa MU2335 11:35 – 14:40 ( Eastern China Airlines )

For various reasons, we were unable to get the direct flight by Eastern China Airlines from Xian to Lhasa for today’s flight. We use Sichuan Airlines’s flight 3U8687 taking off at 7:50 am.

Early this morning we have to get up around 4:30 am and leave our lodging hotel in Xian at 5:30am to catch the early 7:50 am flight since Xian Xianyang International Airport is approxi. 50km from the city of Xian, which take one hours’ driving.

Xian Airport has two terminals – T1 and T2. The airlines at T1 include China Southern Airlines (CZ), Xiamen Airlines (MF), Sichuan Airlines (3U) and Chongqing Airlines (OQ). The airlines at T2 include Air China (CA), Hainan Airlines (HU), Shenzhen Airlines (ZH), Shanghai Airlines (FM), Shandong Airlines (SC), East Star Airlines (8C), Lucky Air (8L), Kunpeng Air (VD) and Grand China Express (GS).

Make sure you have the right terminal when you use Xian Airport. So we go to the Terminal 1 for the flight by Sichuan Airlines, which is just next to the Terminal 2.

We first fly from Xian to Xining ( the capital city of Qinghai Province ). The 770km Xian to Xining flight takes takes us 1 hours and 10 minutes. At Xining Airport, we have to take all our carry-on bags, disembark, get temporarily boarding passes for the transit flight and wait in the lounge of Xining Airport. The whole flight transit at Xining takes about one hour. Then we board the same plane with the same seats again for the flight from Xining to Lhasa.

The 1238km flight from Xining to Lhasa takes us 2 hours and 20 minutes, which is the highlight of the flight experience from Xian to Lhasa. The 1238km flight route covers the Qinghai Tibet Plateau from northeast (Xining) to southwest (Lhasa), unfolding us the beautiful geographical landforms – snow mountains, desert, rivers and alpine meadows…

We arrive at Lhasa at 12:40 as scheduled. This is my second visit to Lhasa. Seeing the familiar Lhasa Airport reminds me of the my first Tibet Trip eascorting a tour group from Romania.

This time we are very lucky to use the just completed Lhasa Airport Expressway from the airport to the city of Lhasa. The newly finished Lhasa airport expressway shortens the old airport highway from 90km to 65km, taking us just one hour from the airport to Lhasa city.

See below some of the photos I take on my flight from Xian to Lhasa vis Xining crossing the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau:

The boarding gate for 3U8687 Xian Xining Lhasa Flight. Boarding the plane Airbus A319