Commercial airports across the former Yugoslavia handled a combined total of 28.941.011 passengers during the first three quarters of the year, with 4.03 million travellers in September alone. Among them, during the ninth month of the year, three airports stood out for their high growth rates. They include Tivat with a year-on-year increase in September of 33.6%, Zadar with 31.6% growth, and Sarajevo, which had a 30.6% boost in numbers. On the other hand, several regional airports underperformed during the month, including Tuzla, which saw a 27.3% slide in figures, Niš, which had 18.7% fewer passengers than in September 2023, and Banja Luka, which shed 11.3% of its travellers year-on-year. A number of other airports also saw their figures decline compared to last year, among which are Ohrid, Rijeka, Kraljevo, Mali Lošinj and Maribor.
Passenger performance by airport, September 2024
During the January - September period, Belgrade Airport ranked as the 72nd busiest on the continent, just behind Basel, Reykjavik and Lanzarote but ahead of Glasgow, Sofia and Rhodes. Zagreb positioned itself as the 110th busiest, behind Chania, Olbia, and Leeds, but in front of Split, Nuremberg and Trondheim. Pristina took 115th place. It was immediately behind the abovementioned, but ahead of the likes of Billund, Stavanger, and Verona. Skopje ranked 134th, with the Macedonian capital behind Memmingen, Cork, and Treviso but outperforming Ponta Delgada, Zakynthos and Tromso. With over 1.5 million additional passengers by the end of September compared to last year, Croatia is the fastest growing market in the former Yugoslavia in 2024 based on the number of added travellers.
Passenger performance by airport, January - September 2024
Number of added year-on-year passengers by market, January - September 2024
European rank of select regional airports by passenger numbers
Most European markets saw year-on-year growth during the first three quarters of the year. The exceptions were Belarus, Russia (-15.6%), Bosnia and Herzegovina (-4.1%) and Armenia (-2.0%). London Heathrow was once again Europe’s busiest airport over the eight-month period, with 63.086.952 passengers, while Istanbul’s main gateway was second with 60.703.085 travellers. The pair saw growth of 6.2% and 5.0% on 2023 respectively. They were followed by Paris Charles de Gaulle with 52.930.804 passengers, Amsterdam with 50.551.419, Madrid with 49.739.434 travellers, Frankfurt with 46.713.588, Barcelona with 41.926.396, Rome Fiumicino with 37.362.849, London Gatwick with 33.484.202, and Munich with 31.394.621 passengers. Out of Europe’s top ten busiest, half are still below their pre-pandemic 2019 records. They include Paris Charles de Gaulle (-8.9%), Amsterdam (-7.4%), Frankfurt (-13.8%), London Gatwick (-7.7%), and Munich (-14.2%)
Largest airlines by scheduled seat capacity across the former Yugoslavia, September 2024
Ryanair is the true winner!
ReplyDeleteThe real competition this year is between Sarajevo and Podgorica :D
ReplyDeleteSarajevo will win no doubt :)
DeleteIt's pretty close
DeleteIt is impressive that Kosovo added more passengers so far this year than Serbia did!
ReplyDeleteIs this because of W6?
It is because they got visa liberalization this year to the EU.
Delete@09:12 Nothing impressive there. The difference comes from stagnation of passenger growth in Serbia, because of Wizz - not because PRN grew by alot.
Delete09:13 Not exactly. In 2023 PRN grew by 17%. In 2024 it's only around 13%.
13% growth after 17% growth is highly impressive.
Delete@10:24
Delete17% growth with visa regime vs. 13% growth WITHOUT Visa regime?
In what Universe is that highly impressive? 😅
Congrats to all airports
ReplyDeleteThanks for the list.
ReplyDelete+1
DeleteSuch a shame that such a touristic city with so many foreign visitors like Mostar still has so little traffic
ReplyDeleteIt is getting a Sky Alps base next summer so things will improve
DeleteThing is they had considerably more passengers 12 years ago. Without any subsidies or bases.
DeleteSo this year there will be 11 airports with over 1 million passengers. I think that's a first.
ReplyDeleteIf you think about it, it is actually amazing that airports like Antalya or Mallorca generate the entire traffic of all ex-YU airports combined.
DeletePeople in these comments never think about it. It's always a "competition" between Zagreb/Belgrade, Serbia/Croatia and Skopje/Pristina but with zero wider perspective.
DeleteHa ha how yes no. Between ZAG and BEG... It´s not a real competition. It is more between ZAG and PRN.
DeletePeople view them as competition even though most (although not all) markets in ex-Yu are incomparable
DeleteSkopje still has room for improvement, the catchment area is excellent, they just need to work in bringing more routes.
ReplyDeleteNew routes coming next year
DeleteYes they have announced Barcelona, Lyon and Stuttgart
DeleteThere will be more
DeleteThat would be great. Let's see.
DeleteNot bad at all
ReplyDeleteCollectively it's far from great.
DeleteWell it's an improvement on last year
Delete26.1 million
DeleteOk then they have generally done well if you take into account all the issues with engines.
DeleteRemember those guys saying SJJ will overtake SKP this winter? These results are good reality check.
ReplyDeleteChill, noone said SJJ will overtake SKP this winter. People said that SJJ has decreased the gap between the two A LOT, considering how SKP had more than double passengers than SJJ, and they said ho SJJ i slowly but surely closing the gap between them and SKP.
DeleteSJJ cannot be close to SKP not even to overtake , SKP even with all the cuttings is still reaching close to 300k pax in a single month , number that SJJ never had , and also SKP in winter is still with more then 200k which SJJ as you can see drop below 200k
DeleteJust wait and see :) SJJ started doing only this year what SKP was doing with subsidies for 10 years, and only in April started with Ryanair flights. On top of that, besides SJJ Bosnia has OMO, BNX and TZL, while MK has only Ohrid. At least 11 more destinations will be opened next year in SJJ as well :)
DeleteYes and before covid Ohrid had more routes and was more succesfully then all airports you mention in Bosnia :))) thats the reality.
DeleteAlso the gap now between SKP and SJJ is 800k diffrence. SKP getting new routes for a month again ,W6 is coming back stronger next year ,SJJ can have successes yes cannot reach SKP and thats reality. Btw OHD next year will start renovating its terminal building ,getting more new routes , plus charters , so the years that coming both SKP and OHD will be very strong , especially with W6 return.
I would wait until tomorrow before making conclusions if SJJ can reach SKP next year ;)
DeleteSorry, but what are you talking about? Ohrid 2019 - 317,000 passengers, Tuzla 2019 - 593,000 passengers. In what reality was Ohrid more successful than all airports in Bosnia? Your realities are great I have to say :))
Delete12:36 I am speaking for the routes that OHD have before 2019 , not for the numbers , check and make compare between Ohrid and Tuzla airport and decide which airport had better routes and airlines.SJJ was also dead now this days shows little better results which is okay I dont say no , but still is far away far from SKP.
DeleteYou can wait we all will wait SKP will finish the year close to 3m SJJ close to 2m
Haha oh yes sure, its the "high quality routes" that count, not the number of passengers. So would you say SJJ is better than SKP then because it has for example SAS, Flydubai, Qatar, and Ryanair and SKP doesnt? :)) Again, your "realities" are awesome haha, love them!
DeleteOf course I am real my friend , SJJ in the moment for a less not much have good connections then SKP , I dont say they are better but they have sometning ehat we dont have. But for the numbers we are in big diffrence right ? :))in other hand we cannot compare Ohrid which is 20k population city and Tuzla close to 200k , they now have what Ohrid had before 2019 unfortunately ...
DeleteI remember those guys saying that SKP was going to overtake PRN this year. Good one :D
Delete17:12 I remember that was 2 years ago not now :D
DeleteI know DBV has gone to bed with Ryanair but I think the management is very shortsighted about it. They just wanted a quick fix to get back to 2019 passenger numbers after a bad 2023. But such a tourist hotspot with just a single long haul flight shows me they are not doing enough. Crazy there there are no flights to China, South Korea or Japan. Crazy that Flydubai is the only Gulf airline flying there. They really need to wake up.
ReplyDeleteCanada too
DeleteI agree. There is a lot of long haul seasonal demand.
DeleteWell at last United is increasing DBV to daily next year which is good news
Delete*at least
DeleteZAD having more passengers than Ljubljana says everything about Ljubljana's management.
ReplyDeleteIt has more than Podgorica and Sarajevo too
Delete@09:49
DeleteSo out of 16 airports that are behind Zadar, you're only salty about Ljubljana?
It wont have more than Sarajevo at the end of the year.
DeleteYes because it's the capital city of one of the most developed countries in Europe that had more traffic than Zadar for many many years.
DeleteSlovenia one of the most developed countries in Europe? LOL!
DeleteWhy LOL? Slovenia is one of the most developed countries in the world on holistic index measures.
DeleteThere is s rumor that eurowings will base a plane next ss25 season flying to berlin, dusseldorf etc
DeleteJust 2 routes. No base
DeleteRecord numbers at BEG continue despite Wizz troubles.
ReplyDeleteWizz will rebound next year
DeleteThis time next year...
DeleteYou will see
DeleteIf Wizz doesn't, Air Serbia will. Air Serbia will add over 100 additional weekly flights for summer 2025. Belgrade will have 5 new routes for 2025: Shanghai, Paris Orly, Ibiza, Olbia and Mykonos. Two more aircraft are joining Air Serbia fleet in time for 2025. Airport is shaping up to have 9-10 million passengers next year.
DeleteNothing special will happen in Ljubljana without national carrier...
ReplyDeleteThere is a rumor that eurowings will base a plane in ljubljana next ss season… starting Düsseldorf, Berlin etc
Deletehighly doubt it
DeleteNo base. Just 2 routes 2 weekly
DeleteBit disappointing really
DeleteIt need to work on tourism. Without it, it will be difficult to overtake ZAG.
DeleteWell done PRN. Excellent result.
ReplyDeleteNot to take away from them but I was expecting higher growth with visas gone.
DeleteI thought they would overtake Zagreb but doesn't seem like it.
Delete@anon 15:18 totally agree. However, highest airport taxes and weak LCC presence is not helping at all.
DeleteZAG, SPU and PRN will be competing for number 2 spot in the coming years.
DeleteEven after all the increases in Zagreb and stagnation in Belgrade, Belgrade has again double the passengers. How?
ReplyDeleteMAgic
DeleteTrue, 3 million passengers more. Impressive
DeleteI'm happy to see Tivat finally recovering. Considering there are no longer flights to their biggest market which generated something like 60% of traffic if not more.
ReplyDeletePUY suffers from the same problem as TIV. Heavy dependency from Russian and Ukrainian market.
DeletePula got over the loss of Russian tourists TEN years ago and doubled its passenger numbers after it lost the Russians. PUY's biggest problem is Schengen.
DeleteWhy?
DeleteI'm also wondering why. Aren't most guests from EU?
DeleteWho flies to Mali Losinj? Private planes?
ReplyDeleteYes private flights.
DeleteIs there any plan to develop Mali Losinj for commercial flights?
DeleteThere were plans. With investors from Russia. Everything halted now due to the sanctions.
DeleteHonestly does Mali Losinj really need commercial flights?
DeleteI also don't think so. With RJK and PUY 50 km away, and both underperforming, I really don't see why should LSZ be developed to handle 320s/737s, which were the plans.
DeleteTrue it would be a waste of resources.
DeleteYou think someone going to Losinj will fly to Pula???
Delete@11.59
DeleteMali Losinj Pula distance is 150km not 50km.
It will be interesting how airports perform next year considering all the issues in the aviation industry.
ReplyDeleteI expect record results for most airports.
DeleteI really hope so.
DeleteOne of Europe's biggest markets - Germany is going downhill. Still have not recovered from Covid, economy is crap, Ryanair decimating their network there. Not sure it's going to be all rosy for ex-Yu markets.
DeleteYeah sure, we are hearing the same stories every year.
DeleteWhen will SLO govt announce which airlines applied for sixth tender?
ReplyDeleteOnly Eurowings with two routes. Poor outcome in my opinion.
Deletehttps://www.exyuaviation.com/2024/11/eurowings-plans-ljubljana-flights.html
DeleteWow, the gap between Croatia passenger numbers and other countries is growing more and more. Didnt know its so severe.
ReplyDeleteI mean it really wouldve been weird if it didnt have the gap considering the 1000+km of Adriatic coast lol
DeleteYour comment makes no sense because the biggest airport is not on the coast.
DeleteIt makes sense considering 7 out of 9 are.
DeleteYou should add ATH, VIE and IST just for comparison.
ReplyDeleteWhat for ? There is no reason to compare with these airports being in Top 20 in Europe .
DeleteI don't see the point either. None of those are competitors to any ex-Yu airport.
DeleteCroatia added more passengers than all other markets combined. How come? I know tourism brings people, but they didn't have bad last year either, they are not at Albania level to have this scale of change... Excellent job in DUB, SPU and ZAG this year, I guess.
ReplyDeleteAnswer is simple: Ryanair
Delete1) new base in DBV
2) huge growth in ZAD
3) extra plane in ZAG resulting in new routes and frequencies
Worth mentioning that unlike most countries in ex-Yu, Croatia did not reach pre Covid numbers last year.