The Full Year 2024 traffic report released today by ACI EUROPE confirms that Europe’s airports finally surpassed pre-Covid (2019) passenger volumes last year, welcoming more than 2.5 billion passengers. 

Passenger traffic across the European airport network in 2024 increased by +7.4% when compared to the preceding year, finishing +1.8% above pre-pandemic (2019) levels.

The growth dynamic was:

Mostly driven by international passenger traffic (+8.8% vs 2023) rather than domestic passenger traffic (+2.5% vs 2023), which remained -6.3% below pre-pandemic (2019) levels. 

More pronounced in the first half of the year (H1 at +8.9% vs. H2 at +6%) as well as during off-peak months traditionally associated with lower traffic. This reflects structural aviation market changes, including a partial modal shift to rail, strong cross-border mobility within the EU Single Market, and fastgrowing demand in emerging markets outside the EU. 

Top 5 airports by passenger volume

London-Heathrow retained its position as Europe’s busiest airport in 2024, welcoming 83.9 million passengers. This represented an increase of +5.9% over the previous year, allowing the British hub to surpass its pre-pandemic (2019) levels by +3.7%. 

Istanbul came second with 80.1 million passengers. While its growth somewhat moderated in 2024 (+5.3%) compared to the preceding year due to engine maintenance issues at its hub carrier, the Turkish hub’s passenger traffic stood at an impressive +16.9% above its pre-pandemic (2019) levels. 

Paris-"Charles de Gaulle" held the third position with 70.3 million passengers. The French hub faced headwinds with the Olympic Games limiting traffic growth at +4.3% over 2023 – and remained at -7.7% below pre-pandemic (2019) levels.

Amsterdam-Schiphol welcomed 66.8 million passengers thanks to a +8% increase over 2023, remaining at -6.8% below its pre-pandemic (2019) level.

The Dutch hub was closely followed by Madrid taking the 5th position with 66.1 million passengers – a +9.9% increase over 2023 and also +7.2% above its pre-pandemic (2019) volumes. 

Aside from these top 5 airports, Rome-Fiumicino’s performance is worth noting, with passenger traffic increasing by +20.7% over 2023, and +12.3% over its pre-pandemic (2019) volumes. 

Best performances at mega airports (25 to 40 million passengers) 

While passenger traffic in 2024 at the Majors (over 40 million passengers) stood just slightly above their pre-pandemic (2019) level at +0.6%, Mega airports fared better at +4%.

The best performances in that segment came from Athens (+13.1% vs 2023 | +24.5% vs 2019), Munich (+12.2% vs 2023 | -13.3% vs 2019), Istanbul-Sabiha Gokcen (+11.8% vs 2023 | +17% vs 2019), Copenhagen (+11.7% vs 2023 | -1.1% vs 2019) and Milan-Malpensa (+10.9% vs 2023 | +0.2% vs 2019).

Freight and aircraft movements 

Freight traffic across the European airport network increased dynamically in 2024 at +13.2% over the previous year, with EU+ airports growing by +12.4% and non-EU+ airports by +18.4%. 

The top 5 European airports for freight traffic were: Istanbul (1.97 million tons | 39.6%) replaced Frankfurt (1.95 million tons | -2.5%) as the busiest European airport for freight. The German hub was followed by Paris-"CdG" (1.87 million tons | -1.3%), London-Heathrow (1.53 million tons | 3.2%), Amsterdam-Schiphol (1.49 million tons | -5%) and Liège (1.15 million tons | +28%).

Overall, freight traffic stood at +11.8% when compared to pre-pandemic (2019) volumes. Aircraft movements in Europe were up by +5.1% in 2024 compared to the previous year, but still –3.3% below their pre-pandemic (2019) levels.

The integral version of the report (five pages) is attached to this AVIONEWS.