Guide
EU flight compensation: what Regulation 261/2004 actually pays
By Covered Abroad Research Desk · Last verified July 2026
The compensation ladder
The Commission's Your Europe pages put the same table under both denied boarding and cancellation:
- €250 — flights of 1,500 km or less;
- €400 — flights of more than 1,500 km within the EU, and all other flights between 1,500 and 3,500 km;
- €600 — flights of more than 3,500 km.
If you arrived on time for check-in and were denied boarding, compensation is essentially automatic — the only stated exception is reasonable grounds such as health or safety. On a cancellation, the airline must also offer you a one-off choice between reimbursement of the ticket (plus a return flight to your departure point if you are mid-connection) and re-routing.
Source: Your Europe — Air passenger rights (European Commission), read 6 September 2026.
Delays: what the regulation itself says
Per the text of Regulation 261/2004 itself, assistance duties switch on when the delay reaches two hours for flights of 1,500 km or less, three hours for longer intra-Community flights and flights between 1,500 and 3,500 km, and four hours for everything else. The airline must also give any passenger affected by cancellation, denied boarding or a long delay a written notice setting out the compensation and assistance rules.
Source: Regulation (EC) No 261/2004 — EUR-Lex, read 6 September 2026.
60-second check
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Check my policy"Extraordinary circumstances" — and who has to prove them
The airline escapes compensation only when the cancellation was caused by extraordinary circumstances which could not have been avoided even if all reasonable measures had been taken. The burden of proof sits with the carrier: the Commission's guidance says the airline should prove it with extracts from logbooks or incident reports, and give that evidence to the national enforcement body and the passengers concerned. An unexplained "operational reasons" email is not that.
Source: Your Europe — Air passenger rights, extraordinary circumstances, read 6 September 2026.