There are two schools of thought when it comes to choosing a flight from Dubai or Abu Dhabi to Male in the Maldives. As the flight is only around 4 hours, do we opt for the cheapest to save some money? Or, given how special the Maldives is, should our experience in the air match the experience at our resort or onboard our yacht? These are two valid questions, but actually there are a couple of other important considerations to bear in mind.

For me, the most important is the schedule. What time will the flight arrive and depart? Let me tell you why. First up, you want to get the most out of your holiday, and that means arriving at your resort before the check-in time, which is 2pm. Arrive later in the afternoon or evening and you have lost the first day of your holiday travelling. And it's the same on the return, where you don't really want to be leaving your resort early in the morning wasting your last day. Is it really worth saving a few hundred dirhams on the airfare if it means losing a chunk of your first and last day, especially if you are on a 3- or 4-night break? Another factor that will impact your choice or arrival and departure times is the resort transfer or liveaboard sailing times.  If your resort transfer is by seaplane, you need to ensure that you have reasonable connecting times with a buffer for delays, but you also don't want to be hanging around the airport for hours either.  So, plan to arrive in time to make your seaplane connection or the last boat transfer to your island. The same for the return journey. This needs to be carefully considered before you push the button on the international flights.

Once you have determined your target arrival and departure times, you will start looking for options, probably taking into consideration both Abu Dhabi and Dubai given how close they are. The choice currently is Emirates, flydubai, Etihad and Wizz Abu Dhabi. In terms of product, Emirates from Dubai and Etihad from Abu Dhabi lead the way, but as you would expect they are the most expensive. In terms of choice, Emirates flies 4 times per day with a really good spread of flights throughout the day. Etihad on the other hand only flies once daily, but their schedule does get you to the Maldives at 0615 leaving at 2020 on the way back giving you maximum time at your resort. Quite a bit cheaper you have the option of flydubai's 3 departures from DXB, but their timings from Male are not ideal. Cheapest of all is Wizz from Abu Dhabi, but there is only one flight daily and it doesn't arrive in Male until 2025 and that's an issue as this rules out seaplane transfers, and of course day 1 is lost. The other thing to bear in mind with Wizz - and not many people know this - is that their flight time is 1hr longer in one direction and up to 1hr 25 mins longer in the other because their aircraft are not ETOPS (Extended-range Twin-engine Operational Performance Standards) rated. This basically means that they are restricted to flying a route that is no more than 60 minutes from the closest airport so fly Wizz and your flight path will have you hugging the Indian Coastline. The same applies to one of the three flydubai departures, where their aircraft is a Boeing 737 Max 8. Their other two departures on the Boeing 737 Max 9s are fine. Please note that aircraft, which are NOT ETOPS rated are absolutely safe and you would have flown on these types of planes many times.

So, what would I do? To be honest, given how ridiculously cheap Wizz from Abu Dhabi is, I'd probably fly with them and invest the savings back into my actual stay. But that would mean spending the first night at an airport hotel in Male, so I'd need to be going for 5 nights or longer. For less than 5 nights, I'd probably choose Emirates as their schedule takes some beating.

Below is a summary of the airlines and their fares (cheapest economy with baggage) based on a trip to the Maldives from 22-29 April.   

Harvey Lines   - General Manager, OneMaldives