Two of the big players in French and Austrian skiing open this week and both promise they'll have around 50km of terrain open for their opening days.
The two resorts both have a reputation for opening big areas from day one and for having long season lasting from November to May.
Ischgl is due to open this Thursday, 22nd November, Val Thorens on Friday the 24th – staff at the latter say "about 30%" of their 150km of runs will be open.
Both areas are operating snowmaking systems at capacity 24 hours a day and in Val Thorerns' case a team of a dozen groomers are pushing snow down between 2700m where the main snowline is to resort level at 2300m.
Currently the Austrian ski areas of Hintertux, Obergurgl and Solden have the largest areas open with 31-37km of runs, most other glacier areas have less than 10km of slopes open.
It is also snowing across the Dolomites and the Alps with up to 50cm of snowfall reported so far.
The cross-border skiing shared between Cervinia and Zermatt may also amount to 50km or more but official figures for the combined area are not clearly published.
However in past autumns when there has been limited natural snowfall at lower elevations the region has stressed in its publicity that it has the biggest area open in the Alps in the run up to Christmas.