Since its endorsement by the IATA Board of Governors in December 2023, the Schedule Data Exchange Program (SDEP) has made significant progress. The initiative currently counts on the support of over 160 airlines and a rapidly expanding database capable of ingesting and processing airlines contributed schedules. Recently development milestones marked a major step forward in the program’s evolution.
Onboarded airlines regularly submit their latest flight schedules to IATA. Data is carefully reviewed, organized, and stored in the system. Every Monday, a snapshot of all submitted data -, covering flight schedules from that day up to two years into the future - is extracted and becomes the official version used to create output files for airlines analytics.
The SDEP database is now able to produce two main output files:
Both types include essential details about upcoming flights, such as times, routes, aircraft types, and whether the flight is operated directly or in partnership with another carrier.
To ensure secure and efficient distribution, these files are exchanged through protected digital channels. This weekly routine ensures that stakeholders have access to the most accurate and up-to-date flight information available.
To date, IATA has successfully completed the first few close-outs under this new process, incorporating data from over 90 airlines and covering over 59 million future flights. This milestone underscored the scale and ambition of the program and represents a significant step towards making schedule data more reliable, timely and use-friendly for the industry.
The IATA Schedule Data Exchange Program (SDEP) is designed primarily for analytics rather than schedule distribution. Because airlines join the program at different times, data misalignments may arise. To address this, IATA initially requested 5-10 years of historical data to close these gaps. After a comprehensive review of the challenges involved, it was decided that the collection of historical planned schedule data would begin on January 1, 2025. For all airlines joining the program after that date.
Database development is ongoing, stay tuned for updates on the evolution of the Schedule Data Exchange Program and feel free to contact us at schedule@iata.org should you have any question.
> Learn more about IATA's Schedule Data Exchange Program
