Wow Air
Icelandic low-cost airline
Wow Air, stylized as WOW air, was an Icelandic ultra low-cost carrier operating between 2012 and 2019. The airline was headquartered in Reykjavík and based at Keflavík International Airport. It flew between Iceland and the rest of Europe and North America, and also flew to India as part of a wider plan to expand in Asia. The airline abruptly ceased operations on 28 March 2019, when its operating company WOW air hf. went out of business.
The airline's assets were acquired by United States–based holding company USAerospace Associates, which announced in 2019 and 2020 that the airline was relaunching service; however, flights did not commence, and the media was unable to independently verify the company's statements about its business plans or find evidence of an application for an air operator's certificate.
History
Early developments and expansion (2012–2019)
Iceland's geographic position has made it an attractive stopover point for flights across the Atlantic. In the 1960s, flag carrier Icelandair established a stopover scheme to encourage tourism that continues to this day. Icelandic Airlines, also known as Loftleiðir and remembered by the nicknames "Hippie Airline" and "Hippie Express", also used this approach along with a number of expense-lowering measures to become the first low-cost transatlantic carrier before it merged to form Icelandair. The collapse of the króna due to the Icelandic financial crisis in 2008 and the publicity brought by the 2010 eruption of Eyjafjallajökull to its natural features led to a significant rise in tourism there.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Wow Air” as icelandic low-cost airline. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
Why this record matters
The subject matters to the general reference register because the source frames it as icelandic low-cost airline. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.
The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 25, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1156931. VIAF identifies the subject as 569152138587110980635. 1 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 2012, 2019, 2020 and 2008.
The absence of detail may reflect summary conventions rather than a lack of surviving documentation. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.
- Subject orientation
- Search vocabulary
- Locating named sources
The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “Wow Air”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow Wow Air primary sources, Wow Air archive and Icelandic research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
- Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Wow Air”?
- What terminology or title could unlock a more precise catalogue search?
- Which cited source is closest to the event, object or claim?
Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “Wow Air” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.