Boeing 747History, variants & specifications

Lufthansa

Lufthansa took 81 Boeing 747s, launched the 747-8 Intercontinental in 2006, and is the largest passenger 747 operator left.

Lufthansa Boeing 747-8 Intercontinental on the runway in front of a Lufthansa Technik hangar, in the airline's blue and yellow livery
Lufthansa took 19 of the 48 passenger 747-8s ever built, and still flies them.

Lufthansa took 81 Boeing 747s, and is the reason the last passenger version exists at all.

The 747-8 launch customer

Lufthansa launched the 747-8 Intercontinental on 6 December 2006 and was for a long time its only airline customer. Boeing publicly reassessed the entire programme in early 2009 because of it, with chief executive Jim McNerney saying continuation was not a foregone conclusion.

The programme continued, and Lufthansa took 19 of the 48 ever built — by far the largest fleet.

Its influence shows in the aircraft. The 747-8’s sweeping staircase was originally to be on the right-hand side and was moved back to the left after Lufthansa’s order.

Still flying

Lufthansa is one of only four airlines still operating scheduled passenger 747 services, alongside Air China, Korean Air and Rossiya — and by a wide margin the largest.

In December 2025 it announced it would sell two 747-8s and retire two more 747-400s. The -400s leave by 2027; the -8s are expected to remain core to long-haul into the 2030s.

If you want to fly on a 747 with a first class cabin, Lufthansa is where you can still book one. That will not be true forever, but it is true now.

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