Air Baltic - Baltic low-cost airline

A/S Air Baltic Corporation, operating as AirBaltic, is the Latvian flag carrier airline and a low-cost carrier, with its head office on the grounds of Riga International Airport. The airline was established on 28 August 1995 with the signing of a joint venture between Scandinavian Airlines (SAS) and the Latvian state.

Norwegian Air Shuttle ASA - Scandinavian low-cost airline

Norwegian is a low-cost airline. The company is the second largest airline in Scandinavia, and has a route portfolio that stretches across Europe into North Africa and the Middle East. Norwegian offers a high-frequency domestic flight schedule within Scandinavia and to typical business destinations such as London, combined with a low-frequency service to international destinations from its focus cities.

Norwegian Air Shuttle (NAS) was founded on 22 January 1993 to take over the regional airline services produced by Busy Bee for Braathens in Western Norway.

Germanwings - German low-cost airline

Germanwings is a German low-cost airlinen, which is fully owned by Lufthansa. Germanwings uses Airbus A319-112 and A319-132 aircrafts. Germanwings became a wholly owned Lufthansa subsidiary on 1 January 2009.

EasyJet - British low cost airline

EasyJet Airline Company Limited is a British airline headquartered at London Luton Airport. It carries more passengers than any other United Kingdom-based airline, operating domestic and international scheduled services on 500 routes between 118 European, North African, and West Asian airports. The parent company, EasyJet plc, is listed on the London Stock Exchange.

Ryanair - European low-cost airline

Ryanair is an Irish low-cost airline. Ryanair head office is at Dublin Airport. Two primary airports of Ryanair are Dublin and London Stansted airports.

Ryanair operates using Boeing 737-800 aircrafts. Ryanair is the largest low-cost airline in Europe in terms of passanger numbers and second largest of all airlines in Europe.

Low-cost airline, budget airline, discount airline or no-frills carrier

A low-cost carrier or low-cost airline is an airline that generally has lower fares and less comforts. These airlines may charge for extras like food, priority boarding, seat allocating, and baggage etc.

Low-cost carrier business model usually includes:

• only one passanger class
• limited variety of aircrafts to minimize training costs
• development of one of more hubs to maximise destination coverage
• flying to cheaper secondary airports
• unreserved seating
• direct sales of tickets (usually own website)
• passengers paying charges for extras, such as hold luggage, online check in and priority boarding
• not supplying meals in a flight, but offering snacks, sandwiches and drinks instead to purchase on board

This list of budget airline business model is a summary of the characterics defined at wikipedia. Usually Southwest Airlines (1971) is considered as the first low-cost airline.