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The Italian airline Neos Air will launch a direct flight route between Rome and the province of Holguín on June 29, as announced by the Ministry of Tourism of Cuba through the specialized magazine Sol de Cuba.
The flights will operate every Tuesday, establishing a new direct connection between Europe and the eastern part of the island that previously did not exist without a layover.
The airline's statement describes the proposal as an opportunity to discover "heavenly beaches, authentic culture, and all the warmth of Cuba with a convenient connection from Italy."
According to CiberCuba, the airline's reservation system shows that flights between Rome Fiumicino and Holguín are scheduled to start at the end of June with a weekly frequency and initial prices beginning at 408 euros.
The announcement comes at a particularly challenging time for Cuban tourism. In 2025, the island welcomed only 1.81 million international visitors, the lowest number in two decades, and in the first quarter of 2026 arrivals dropped by 48% compared to the same period the previous year.
This drop was accompanied by a Jet A-1 fuel crisis that, since February 2026, forced eleven airlines to suspend their flights to Cuba, including Air Canada, Air Transat, LATAM, Turkish Airlines, and Iberia.
In this context, the arrival of Neos Air in Holguín represents a counter-cyclical signal for a destination that had seen its European flights suspended at the end of March 2026.
Neos Air, founded in 2001 and a subsidiary of the Italian tourism group Alpitour, operates flights to over 73 national, European, and intercontinental destinations and is the only Italian airline that uses the Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner.
The company has a long history with Cuba. Before the pandemic, it operated routes from Milan to Havana and Holguín, and in June 2022, launched the direct flight from Rome to Havana using a Dreamliner, an aircraft it even named "Ciudad de La Habana."
Holguín is the second tourist hub in Cuba after Varadero, featuring attractions such as Guardalavaca, the Chorro de Maíta —the largest indigenous cemetery in the Antilles—, the Alejandro de Humboldt National Park, declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2001, and the bay of Nipe, where the image of the Virgen de la Caridad del Cobre was found in the 17th century.
The Ministry of Tourism emphasized that the new connection "will favor the arrival of travelers interested in discovering Cuban culture and hospitality, positively impacting the local economy and diversifying markets."
Italy is one of the historically significant European markets for tourism in Cuba, although it recorded a 15.9% decline in visitors in 2024 compared to the previous year, making this new route a strategic move by the airline to reactivate that flow toward the eastern part of the island.
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