Airbus A380 superjumbo history: Pictures, details

An Airbus A380 superjumbo.REUTERS/Pascal Rossignol

• The Airbus A380 is the largest passenger and most expensive airliner in the world.
• The superjumbo has now been in service for more than a decade.
• Airbus has booked 331 orders for the plane but is struggling to find new buyers.
• The A380 is too big, expensive, and inefficient for most operators.
• It will stay in production well into the next decade, but its future remains uncertain.

In 2007, the Airbus A380 entered service to great fanfare. The gargantuan jet, dubbed the superjumbo, was designed to take everything that made the Boeing 747 an icon and push it to the limits of modern engineering.

A decade later, things are very different for the A380.

The superjumbo hasn’t been the game changer Airbus had hoped it would become when the massive double-decker was conceived two decades ago. This is especially the case on the financial front. 

For much of the plane’s life, Airbus has struggled to find airlines willing to put the A380 into service.

With a price tag of $445.6 million, the A380 is one of the most expensive and lavish airplanes ever built. With room for as many as 800 passengers, the double-decker’s sheer size means it’s an occasion whenever a superjumbo arrives.

But in a cost-conscious market and with fluctuating fuel prices, the very attributes that made the plane stand out may have also doomed it. Some say the A380 came two decades too late, while others say that with increasing airport congestion, the plane is ahead of its time.

Some industry observers, such as the Teal Group analyst Richard Aboulafia, have gone so far as to call it the biggest mistake in the history of Airbus. According to Aboulafia, the A380 is a poorly executed aircraft designed for a market that doesn’t really exist. As a result, the $25 billion that Airbus spent on the A380 program could have been better used elsewhere, like on a rival for Boeing’s next-generation 777X or on a true replacement for the aging Boeing 757, Aboulafia told Business Insider.

Regardless, no one can deny the engineering marvel of the aircraft. Here’s a look at the topsy-turvy history of the Airbus A380 superjumbo.