Mumbai Airport T1 Closure: What the Flight Shift to Navi Mumbai Means for NRIs, Renters and Property Owners

If you live abroad and own a home in Mumbai, the airport is where every trip home begins and ends. It is where you land with a bag full of documents for a sale signing, or for a quick visit to check on your flat. So when the way you arrive in Mumbai changes, it is worth a few minutes of your time.

And it is changing. Mumbai airport's old Terminal 1 was set to stop flights on 25 October, and some international flights are being asked to move to Navi Mumbai. Here is what has been reported, what is still being argued over, and how I would think about it as an owner, buyer or tenant.

What has actually happened at Mumbai airport?

Mumbai International Airport Ltd (MIAL), which runs the city's airport, said Terminal 1 would stop flight operations on 25 October 2026, with redevelopment of the terminal set to begin in January 2027, as Business Today reported on 3 October. The same report said the terminal is expected to stay closed until 2029-30, roughly four years, and that the existing T1 complex is about 84 years old.

A few numbers give you a sense of scale. Per that report, the airport handles about 950 flights a day across its two terminals. T1 handled nearly 15 million passengers in FY 2025-26, and T2 about 40 million.

The airlines that flew from T1, which The Week listed as IndiGo, SpiceJet, Alliance Air, Akasa Air and Star Air, were expected to move to T2. To make room at T2, MIAL wants some international flights to go to Navi Mumbai International Airport.

How many international flights are moving to Navi Mumbai?

This is the part that made news last week. On 28 October, Business Standard reported that MIAL had asked airlines to submit plans by 3 November to move one-third of their international flights from Mumbai to Navi Mumbai, starting with the summer 2027 schedule.

• Of 770 weekly international departures, MIAL has sought to shift 265, which works out to about 34%.
• MIAL wants to temporarily move traffic equal to 5 million passengers a year, against the airport's capacity of about 55 million a year. MIAL says this leaves about 91% of current capacity unaffected.
• IndiGo, Air India and Akasa Air have finalised plans to move international flights between January and the summer season, covering about 3 million passengers a year. MIAL wants the remaining 2 million shifted by summer 2027.
• MIAL says the shifted traffic will come back to Mumbai once the Terminal 2 expansion is done, and that combined capacity is expected to rise to 65 million passengers a year after the T1 rebuild and T2 expansion.

Both airports are controlled by the Adani Group, per the same report.

Why are airlines pushing back?

Not everyone is on board. Business Standard reported that at a meeting with the Airline Operators Committee, many airlines, especially foreign carriers, opposed slot reductions from summer 2027 and asked for traffic data, proper consultation and a phased approach. Earlier, The Week reported that the International Air Transport Association (IATA) opposed forced relocations and asked the Civil Aviation Ministry to step in, and that Air France-KLM was also resisting a move to Navi Mumbai.

MIAL's side, per Business Standard, is that T1 needs to be demolished and rebuilt for safety reasons, that the work has been delayed for more than nine years, and that structural audits by Structwel (2017) and IIT Bombay (2024) back this up.

My reading is that the direction is clear, even if the exact airline list and dates may still move. I'd treat the summer 2027 schedule as the window to watch, and I would not assume any particular airline or route until it is confirmed on your ticket.

Which Mumbai airport will my international flight use?

For now, the honest answer is: check every booking. The Week advised travellers to look at whether a flight is listed under BOM (Mumbai) or NMI (Navi Mumbai). If you book a trip home for, say, a registration or a possession date, build in a little slack, because the airport you land at decides how long the road trip into the city takes.

This matters more than it sounds. One of our published cases is a London-based NRI owner selling two flats in Worli. There was no power of attorney, so the owner flew in to sign in person. We had every document ready before the owner landed, both sales were signed the same day, and the rest of the trip was free for personal work. When a trip is that tightly planned, knowing your arrival airport in advance is part of the plan.