Frankfurt and Istanbul ranked among the busiest routes at Belgrade, Zagreb, and Ljubljana airports during the first quarter of 2025. Ahead of the release of Q2 results, Q1 data also shows that each of the three airports had one Gulf service within their ten busiest routes, while Paris and Amsterdam featured in the top ten at all three as well.
In Belgrade, Istanbul’s main gateway retained its position as the busiest route. However, the airport’s overall performance in the first quarter was weighed down by Wizz Air’s widespread frequency cuts, which led to declines across nearly all of its services from the Serbian capital. Routes such as Barcelona, jointly operated by Air Serbia and the low cost carrier, were among those affected. In contrast, notable growth was recorded on the Amsterdam and Paris services, while several destinations outside the top ten also posted strong gains, including Tivat and Larnaca.
Belgrade Airport's top ten busiest routes, Q1 2025
At Zagreb Airport, Ryanair continued to fuel strong growth. While most of its services fall outside the top ten busiest routes, they all recorded solid gains, with the London Stansted service performing significantly better than London Heathrow, operated by both Croatia Airlines and British Airways. Domestic demand also strengthened, with Croatia Airlines posting growth on the Split route, while Amsterdam maintained its strong performance through joint operations by the Croatian flag carrier and KLM. Beyond the top ten, notable growth was also observed on services to Malta, Basel, Weeze, and Baden Baden.
Zagreb Airport's top ten busiest routes, Q1 2025
In Ljubljana, Istanbul remained the busiest destination. Lufthansa recorded growth on its Frankfurt and Munich services, although both are still below pre-pandemic levels when they were operated by Adria Airways. Swiss continued to post the strongest gains among Lufthansa Group carriers, with traffic rising over 20% year-on-year and notably surpassing 2019 levels. Outside the top ten, strong growth was also observed on the Podgorica and Warsaw routes.
Ljubljana Airport's top ten busiest routes, Q1 2025
Are there stats for other routes, maybe top 20?
ReplyDeleteIf not 50???
Delete@admin?
DeleteQ2 data will be published soon and will include the majority of routes for each airprot.
DeleteBravo Fraport!
ReplyDeleteWizx Air success on Skopje route should be a good indicator to Fraport how they can overcome a lack of ex-Adria transfer passengers.
DeleteHad they let an ULCC open base LJU would very much have surpassed 2018 and 2019 numbers.
DeleteAny LCC or ULCC is free to open a base in LJU.
DeleteThe biggest winner in Ljubljana is definitely Air Serbia. As much as 48% more passengers compared to 2019.
DeleteThat Skopje - Ljubljana route is still underserved, at least 5 times a week, come on
DeleteAny LCC or ULCC is free to open a base in LJU. - This mindset is why Slovenia is falling behind. No one is going to request it to come - it's neither big nor prosperous.
DeleteFraport Slovenia has said ULCC does not fit into their business model.
Delete@11.08 they benefited a lot on the Slovenian market from Adria's bankruptcy.
DeleteNo need for LCC. LJU is premium airport 😃
DeleteTako je i ZAG bio “premium airport” pa je podvio rep, pristao na ucene najveceg predatora.
Delete17.32
DeleteIsto kao i Barcelona, Madrid, Fiumicino, Atena, Prag, Budimpesta, Sofia, Bec, Bukurest, Amsterdam, Copenhagen, Stockholm....Ili sam se ja zabunio pa najveći predator na njih ne leti nego samo u ZAG?
Збунио си се. Разлика између тих аеродрома и Загреба је та што су сва та тржишта знатно већа и ту Рајанер има опаку конкуренцију. Ето примера ради, у Софији која је величине Београда, Рајанер конкурише Визеру који има чак 7 базираних ваздухоплова. Није то мало.
DeleteКоју конкуренцију има Рајанер у Загребу? Зато је он ту предатор и то много већи него на аеродромима које си набројао.
Nisam se zbunio. Predator uništava konkurenciju i tjera druge kompanije sa aerodroma koji mu je plijen ili na njih dolazi kao jedini prijevoznik. To nije kontekst u kojem je Ryanair došao u Zagreb. A za Zagreb redovno leti 20 kompanija koje unatoč Ryanairu uglavnom pojačavaju promet i uvode veće avione i više frekvencija. Pa čak i nesposobna Croatia Airlines. Točno, tržište Zagreba i Hrvatske manje je od gore navedenih, ali to ne znači da je FR na njemu predator. Naprotiv, on je dobrodošla konkurencija, na korist i aerodromu i putnicima.
DeleteThese numbers show how insignificant our region is.
ReplyDeleteWhy?
Delete+1
Delete@09:16
DeleteWe have become feeders for IST and FRA.
What do you mean "insignificant" when BEG is approaching 10M passengers in a year? The story is about the airport, not Air Serbia. Obviously the demand for long haul travel is growing and that will benefit JU as well by opening up opportunities for more destinations to offer direct flights.
Deleteanon 9:16 and Amsterdam.
DeleteNo such thing as our region.
DeletePametnjaković
Delete12.51
DeleteNo such things as ex-yu aviation, covering ex-yu region? How come you write here then?
@9.18
DeleteThe Balkans still depend on big hubs instead of developing more direct long-haul links.
BEG is NOT close to 10 million. BEG is barely getting closer to 9 million. That's half of what Prague or Vienna handle in the first six months.
DeleteOk, my bad, not close to 10 but 9 million passengers. So what? It changes nothing in the main point of my comment. There is growth in demand for long haul flights and it is normal that it shows first in the increased numbers on flights to big hubs. Comparing Belgrade with hot spots for tourism like Prague and Vienna is just meaningless.
DeleteHow come such strong growth on BEG-CDG?
ReplyDeleteAir Serbia added more flights.
Delete^ thanks
DeleteFrench tourist here flying soon from CDG, please don't tell me Belgrade is not already crowded by the French that I'm trying to avoid for my city trip :D
DeleteDon't worry, it's not full of French. Most of foreigners in Belgrade are from ex-yu countries, Russia, Turkey and China
DeleteI think there is also increased business travel. More and more French companies doing business in Serbia. Of course not saying this whole growth is being generated by them, just making an observation.
DeleteMoscow case is surprising. With a good portion of Moscow-Europe traffic funneled via Belgrade, we're pretty much at the same numbers vs. 2019.
ReplyDeleteBut it's still 12% precovid.
Delete*12% below
DeleteWIth JU picking up the entire chunk of the traffic, while in 2019 SU was the dominant player
DeleteI think LED has a much bigger increase.
DeleteDid Aeroflot operate LED-BEG?
DeleteBefore covid, massive number of Chinese tourists traveled via Moscow. Chinese were no. 1 tourists in Serbia at that time
Delete@9.44 yes they did but low frequency. I think 1 weekly.
Delete@9.54 I think Chinese are now number two.
DeleteThere were two carriers pre-covid and now only ju....
DeleteWho would have thought that either Dubai or Doha would be in the top 10 for all three.
ReplyDeleteIt's actually a no-brainer that JU should start it.
DeleteI think it would be very hard for JU to compete against either FZ or QR. But Abu Dhabi would be worth a try.
DeleteShould have tried Abu Dhabi this winter.
DeleteInteresting numbers
ReplyDelete+1
DeleteWtf happened to Transavia in LJU?!
ReplyDeleteThankfully KLM taking over now.
DeleteAnd KLM is much more reliable than Transavia.
DeleteAMS numbers exploded when KLM started flights. You will see in Q2 numbers.
DeleteWell it makes sense when frequnecies more than doubled and there are two airlines now flying.
DeleteSwiss is killing it in LJU. I still don't get why they don't try Zagreb.
ReplyDeleteI also think that with their network they could have solid loads but probably an LH Group decision. Remember ZAG has Austrian which does not fly to Ljubljana.
DeleteSwiss has been a positive surprise for me in LJU. Market is stronger than I expected.
DeleteMore to follow. Slovenia meanwhile is Switzerlands 3rd biggest trading partner and Sandoz will invest a further bln EUR in Slovenia. Guess double daily in SUTT is just around the corner
DeleteThese numbers again confirm to me that Zagreb management absolutely made the right decision getting Ryanair to open a base.
ReplyDelete+1
DeleteIt's not like they had any other options.
DeleteZAG numbers today could have been at least double if OU hadn't been tiny insignificant shameful miserable feeder which didn't use a single advantage and potential of croatian and wider ex-yu and Balkans market(s), and missed to make ZAG hub for SE Europe
DeleteCroatia Airlines still can’t capitalize properly even on its strongest markets. Time for the government to push for real change.
DeleteYou can't have a hub in a 700.000 city with seasonal demand.
DeleteMaybe in the Middle East but not Europe.
Zagreb metropolitan aerea is 1.200.000. The same as for example, Amsterdam. Not to mention Riga, with 800.000 metropolitan population, in much smaller and poorer country with almost no tourism. And as far as I remember, both are in Europe, not Middle East. Having real hub increases demand and reduces seasonality, not the other way round. But 3rd floor in Buzin must find any excuse, lies and manipulation included, for their incompetence, the same as Središnjica for their crime and corruption
DeleteCopenhagen, Zurich, Dublin..... big hubs in cities with population of 7 hundred thousand or less
DeleteReykyavik, bigger village, literally
All in Europe
@PIR Zagreb iz small with less than 700.000 people. Metro area of Novi Sad have close to 700.000 people. Also Zagreb has road tourists on short trips from visiting coast, Hungary, Slovenia ets. No one go fly to visit Zagreb! So same level as Riga. So there are results. It is not same to be second city in 24 million country once and number 1 in 3.5 million country.
DeleteYou live in the past 20.50. Zagreb is part of the single EU market which is 450 mil, not 24. The problem of ZAG is OU which is unable and unwilling to capitalize being part of such huge market. And once again, Zagreb metropolitan aerea is 1.200.000, not 700.000. No one go fly to visit Zagreb, yeah right, US tourists which are number two in numbers in Zagreb usually swim over Atlantic, Spanyards walk, and Koreans take buses and trains. People write lot of nonsenses here, but your quantity of nonsenses in this post really exceeded all usual limits
DeleteOut of interest (I'm not from Croatia), how come Dubrovnik route is busier than Split in winter time? Would have thought since Split is a bigger city there would be more passengers on Zagreb route than Dubrovnik.
ReplyDeleteYes it's interesting also because Ryanair now also has flights from Dubrovnik in winter.
DeleteBecause Split is closer and have highway connected to Zagreb
Delete^ makes sense. Thank you
DeleteAlso, Split has direct winter flights to Frankfurt, Munich and Rome (all daily) which Dubrovnik don't have.
DeleteIt is interesting to see that the number of passengers between ZAG-FRA and BEG-FRA has almost equalized.
ReplyDeleteDanke Dojcland for that
DeleteDanke JU dafür!
DeletePeva Danke Deutschland cela Jugoslavija
DeleteSve se oko tebe ispravlja i savija....
Ali barem više nismo u mraku komunizma iza željezne zavjese...
Stavio bi i smajlić da nije za plakanje...
Well Lufthansa does carry a lot of transfers from BEG despite there being so many nonstop flights. My guess is that demand is growing much faster than the offer from Belgrade. What can people do, they have to connect.
DeleteWhy is Barcelona experiencing such a big decline compared to last year?
ReplyDelete"was weighed down by Wizz Air’s widespread frequency cuts, which led to declines across nearly all of its services from the Serbian capital. Routes such as Barcelona, jointly operated by Air Serbia and the low cost carrier, were among those affected."
DeleteZagreb-London Stansted outperforming Heathrow makes sense. People want cheap and frequent connections, not expensive legacy carriers.
ReplyDeleteIt also makes no sense to pay all that money to BA when you get the same service as with FR.
DeleteThe fact that every airport has at least one Gulf service in its top ten shows just how important that market has become for the region. Both P2P and transfer traffic.
ReplyDeleteVery few P2P to Doha but for Dubai quite a lot.
DeleteLJU one of the rare capital city airports in Europe with just one airline on each route.
ReplyDeleteYes I think LJU has one airline for each route. No competition for anyone.
DeleteThey are also the only one of these three with 2 ex-Yu cities in the top ten :D
DeleteFZ numbers in BEG are crazy. And next week 3rd daily flight begins.
ReplyDeleteP2P traffic started to grow exponentially during covid and continued from there.
DeleteAmsterdam in the top ten at all three airports doesn’t surprise me. It’s the perfect hub. KLM really knows how to connect smaller markets to the world.
ReplyDeleteIt's good for going west, but a lot of backtracking if going east.
DeleteTurkish is doing very well across all of ex-Yu.
ReplyDeleteThey are doing well across the world.
DeleteGood to see Swiss booming in Ljubljana. Shows there is premium demand out of Slovenia
ReplyDeleteLX offers quite attractive rates out of LJU. We booked tickets to AGP for less than 200 EUR return
DeleteRyanair is carrying Zagreb on its back.
ReplyDeleteWith OU about to receive their 6th A220, they will carry them even more. I think OU will struggle even more in the future... especially financially.
DeletePodgorica from Ljubljana in the top growth outside the ten? Nice
ReplyDelete