Changi Airport’s Terminal 2 to fully reopen ahead of schedule in October 2023

Changi Airport’s Terminal 2 (T2) is set to fully reopen in October 2023, a few months ahead of its original re-opening date scheduled for 2024.

This will mark the first time that T2 is fully operational since its closure in May 2020 for upgrading works, with parts of the terminal being reopened in phases from May 29, 2022.

Announced on Wednesday (May 3) at the Changi Airline Awards, Minister for Transport and Minister-in-charge of Trade Relations S. Iswaran spoke of how this would how this would boost Singapore’s aviation sector’s post-COVID recovery and ensure that “Changi has both the physical and operational capacity to support the increase in flights and passengers”.

The Northern wing of T2 will open its doors to passengers again and operate alongside the Southern wing that saw its reopening last year on Oct 11.

According to Mr Iswaran, T2’s full reopening would bring about more passengers and add 20 million passengers per year to Changi Airport’s capacity. The airport’s total capacity would be increased to 90 million passengers per year, which is higher than pre-COVID rates of 85 million.

New amenities, F&B outlets and retail stores will also be opened at T2, which serves to “further enhance the distinctive Changi travel experience”.

While Changi Airport is slowly recovering from COVID-19’s impact on the aviation sector, the sector’s workforce is at about 90 per cent of its pre-pandemic levels. There are plans to return it back to 100 per cent by the end of 2023, said Mr Iswaran.

In addition to T2’s full reopening, Changi Airport Group (CAG) will work on “enhancements to expand our (Changi Airport’s) capacity” through initiatives such as redesigning Terminal 1’s Arrival Immigration Halls, with more space and automated lanes to be added by 2025.

CAG also has plans to “transform the passenger journey through Changi Airport” with passport-less travel, with first trials targeted to hit Terminal 3 in June 2023.

The design and planning of Terminal 5 has restarted again, and construction is scheduled to commence by 2025 for its completion in the mid-2030’s. CAG said that the new terminal should be able to handle about 50 million passengers per year.