Air India is reportedly considering the potential acquisition of “several” Boeing 737 Max narrowbody airplanes, which remain undelivered to Chinese-based airlines amid ongoing tensions between the US Government and China. The carrier joins the queue of several airlines that have their own Boeing 737 MAX aircraft on order but are vying to jump the queue and acquire aircraft earlier than they would otherwise receive their own aircraft.
As reported by Bloomberg, the Tata Group-owned carrier, which is desperate to expand the fleet of its Air India Express low-cost subsidiary to better compete with the likes of IndiGo, plans to approach Boeing concerning acquiring aircraft that had been ordered by but will not now be delivered to Chinese carriers due to the ongoing trade rift between the US and China.
The aircraft concerned were in the final stages of being completed and handed over to several Chinese airlines, but have now been caught up in the political wrangling, with tariffs that have been imposed by both countries on each other’s goods thwarting the handover process. Only on April 22, 2025, two Boeing 737s heading from the Boeing plant near Seattle in the US to their respective customers in China returned to their point of origin, although the exact reason for this has not been disclosed.
Not only is Air India eager to take up these (and other) 737 aircraft should they become available in the short term, but the carrier is also keen to pick up any future delivery slots that may be vacated by other airlines should the international trade war continue. Air India is undergoing a period of rapid transformation and growth, yet this process is being hindered by the lack of available aircraft to expand its fleet.
The prospect of Air India taking on aircraft that had originally been intended for Chinese carriers is not without precedent. The airline has benefited from China’s airlines withdrawing from acquiring Boeing aircraft in the past, with the carrier adopting 41 737 MAX jets into its fleet that were originally built for Chinese airlines but whose deliveries were deferred following the type’s worldwide grounding in 2019 following two fatal crashes.
According to Bloomberg, representatives from neither Air India nor Boeing were able to comment on the reports that the parties had entered negotiations for any specific aircraft. The story follows another that Malaysia Airlines is also having talks with Boeing about any 737 MAX aircraft that might become unexpectedly available in the short and medium terms, as it too looks to expand amid rising demand for its services.
Chinese airlines had been told by the Chinese government not to accept Boeing aircraft for the time being, Bloomberg News reported earlier in April 2025. The move followed after the authorities in Beijing set reciprocal tariffs of up to 125% on US-made goods. Around ten aircraft were in the process of being prepared for delivery to Chinese carriers at the time.
However, transferring aircraft between airline customers at relatively short notice is far from a simple process. A series of pre-delivery payments will have been made by the original customer, and the aircraft are likely to have been equipped with engines, cabin interiors, and potentially even painted in the colors of the ordering airline. Lastly, any airline stepping in to acquire these aircraft will have to arrange their own financing and insurance packages and may also need to recruit more crew to fly them.
Air India was already set to receive nine stored 737 MAXs before June 2025, taking its total fleet of the type to over 50 planes, Bloomberg News has previously reported. These aircraft remain part of a backlog of aircraft that have remained in storage after their original owners cancelled orders after the 2019 grounding over safety concerns.