Air Serbia and Croatia Airlines are among Europe’s top fifty largest carriers this winter season based on available seat capacity, which is considered a key industry metric. During the 2025/26 winter season, Air Serbia is the continent’s 40th largest airline, while Croatia Airlines takes 48th position. The Serbian carrier ranks just behind Smartavia, Air Dolomiti and Icelandair, but ahead of the likes of Nordwind Airlines, Aeroitalia and Discover Airlines. On the other hand, its Croatian counterpart positioned itself behind TUIfly, Southwind Airlines and Luxair but ahead of Air Corsica, TAROM and KM Malta Airlines. If non-European carriers are taken into consideration as well, the Middle East’s Big Three - Emirates, Qatar Airways and Etihad Airways - all have more capacity on the European market than the two national carriers from the former Yugoslavia, while the likes of Thai Airways, LATAM, Cathay Pacific, Singapore Airlines, Ethiopian Airlines and Egyptair are ahead of Croatia Airlines.
This winter season, Air Serbia has 2.045.320 seats on the market. The figure represents an increase of 5.8% and the first time the carrier’s capacity has surpassed two million during the winter period. Since the pandemic, Air Serbia has pursued aggressive fleet and network expansion, which has resulted in the airline lifting its winter capacity by 87% on the 2018/19 winter, which was the last unaffected by the global health emergency. As a result, this winter sees over one million additional seats.
Over the course of the ongoing 2025/26 winter, Croatia Airlines has 1.159.788 available seats. The figure represents an increase of 19.3% on the back of its expanded network and ongoing transition to a single-type fleet. It also marks the carrier’s largest winter, based on the amount of available capacity, on record. Compared to the 2018/19 period, Croatia Airlines has lifted its capacity by 20.8%.
This winter, Ryanair remains the continent’s largest airline with over 76 million seats. It is followed by easyJet (37.1 million), Turkish Airlines (34.2 million), Wizz Air (32.6 million), Lufthansa (24.3 million), British Airways (24 million), Pegasus Airlines (20.5 million), Air France (20.4 million) and KLM (17.2 million). Emirates is the continent’s largest foreign carrier this summer with over 10.4 million seats on the market. It is followed by Qatar Airways, United, Delta, Etihad Airways and Air China. Air Montenegro is among Europe’s smallest airlines.
Not bad. Eye catching to me is that TAROM has fallen so far behind.
ReplyDeleteIt's sad what TAROM has become.
DeleteWizz Air with 20+ based planes, Ryanair, Animawings, HiSky, FlyOne.....
DeleteWhy did they fall behind so much? What happened?
DeleteTAROM cannot expand because it is under a state restructuring program approved by the European Commission.
DeleteThe conditions of this aid prohibit the airline from opening new routes or increasing its fleet until the end of 2026, and due to intense competition including strong regional rivals — it is struggling to stay profitable, even recently suspending its route to Thessaloniki.
Tarom suffered from a long line of bad, very bad CEOs. On top of that they are facing a crazy amount of competition on the home market which is putting pressure on their finances.
DeleteThey only had one competent CEO, I think he was from Luxembourg, but he didn't last despite improving things at the airline.
Thanks for the insight guys. It's a shame though
DeleteTAROM suffers from being a state owned legacy airline in the liberalized aviation market of 2025. No CEO can fix that.
DeleteAnon 09:13 Thessaloniki is not suspended , it became seasonal for the summer timetable , just like last year .
DeleteI wonder where Bulgaria Air is on the list
DeleteCrazy to think Emirates is bigger in Europe than these two
ReplyDeleteA380 ops and lots of frequencies and destinations.
DeleteAir China is even more interesting
DeleteEK flies only to London (all airports combined) 13 times a day with a mix of A350/380/B777 let alone to other destinations as well
DeleteThey have a crazy amount of capacity into Europe. To most Western European capitals they fly several times per day.
DeleteIf JU and OU merged then they would be even bigger!
DeleteFlying A380s definitely helps bring up capacity.
DeleteOU smaller than Luxair...
ReplyDeleteAnd they were smaller than Luxair in summer too which is really surprising.
DeleteThey have been overtaken by nearly every mid-sized European airline.
DeleteAnd before Air Serbia they were bigger than Jat Airways.
DeleteHonestly i was expecting OU to be lower.
DeleteAnd in future OU will join Adria and BH Airlines
Delete^ Don't get your hopes up
DeleteSadly, this shows how irrelevant we are.
ReplyDeleteTrue
DeleteNo one comes even close to Ryanair
ReplyDeleteIndeed. Love them or hate them, they rule in Europe.
DeleteVery interesting numbers. That's a big difference between number one and two.
ReplyDeleteI'm surprised too. I knew Ryanair was the biggest but not so far ahead of everyone.
DeleteWow at the fact that JU added over 1 million seats in 6 years.
ReplyDeleteImpressive
Delete^ Is it?
DeleteYou improoved your bussiness by 80% in 6 years as well?
DeleteCome on
Air Serbia’s 87% increase in winter capacity since 2019 is huge.
DeleteTen years ago, it wouldn’t even have made the top 80.
Delete^ true that
DeleteSorry can't get around to celebrating being the top 50
ReplyDeleteI didn't even knew there were 50 European airlines.
DeleteOf course there are
DeleteThere are probably around a 100.
DeleteHere's the Wikipedia list:
Deletehttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_largest_airlines_in_Europe
Air Serbia is in top 40. Let's celebrate that! :-)
DeleteWhy is Air Serbia not restoring Cairo, Beirut and Tel Aviv?
ReplyDelete+1
DeleteBecause they are long rotations and they do not have enough crew.
DeleteWhy has OU never flown to the Middle East other than Tel Aviv charters? Genuinely curious
DeleteJU prefers to leave the Middle East market to TK.
DeleteWell, now that TBS became a total success, they might consider introducing a similar schedule for CAI.
Delete10.55
DeleteBecause it's opposite direction from Minken and Vrankvurt
@20:47 dull.
DeleteThey will add them soon
DeleteCrazy to think Air Serbia is only 40th in Europe. I would have thought they were much higher.
ReplyDeleteOnly goes to show how much more needs to be done for us to catch up to the rest of Europe.
I think LO will become a major player in the coming years, especially if the rumours are true that they are considering buying Smartwings. This, next to TK's investment in Air Europa, would make Europe's aviation landscape a lot more interesting.
No, they are doomed with decision to replace Ejets with A220s
DeleteSerbia is a very small market overall.
DeletePeople have been talking for the past 5+ years how LO will conquer it all and all that has happened is them becoming less and less relevant.
DeleteLess and less relevant? Good joke.
DeleteLO has kept on expanding over the years and anyone who is following aviation developments is aware of that. This year they put a great focus on expanding from secondary markets in Poland.
Tbh I agree. They're still a tiny, tiny airline. Long-haul routes have actually gone backwards. BUD-JFK/ICN gone. SIN gone. CMB gone. PEK gone. BOM launched in 2022.
DeleteBOS, SFO, IAD, never happened. They struggle terribly with LAX, cancelling it all the time. India and 'Stan routes are about competing on price. No one chooses LOT because its good or reliable, its because its cheap. They have enormous reliability issues with their 787's, some of them seem totally plagued. There's meme's and dedicated FB groups to some planes they break so often.
Like most Poles, I'm very sceptical of their profits. Their operation makes no sense. One day a slot is an E70, next day a 7M8. Yet the turnarounds never change. A route is revenue managed on a E90 then a few days before (or same day) its swapped to a 738 with the added costs of crew and loads more seats. Its a totally different story selling EMB vs 737. What other airline runs routes like this? If it was a good idea, everyone would do it.
Pegasus having the same capacity as Air France or KLM, or being so close to Lufthansa capacity is insane.
ReplyDeleteindeed
DeleteNice, bravo for Croatia and Serbia.
ReplyDeleteAs pointed out in the article, this is about available seats. It doesn’t automatically mean profitability or network strength. Capacity is just one metric.
DeleteOk. But at least it's capacity.
DeleteIt will be interesting to see where both are at in 2026 summer.
ReplyDeleteIf remember correctly JAT was back top 30 or 35 worldwide at the end of the 1980s.
ReplyDeletehttps://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg26ntH-8Fyvmufy6SjL5ntYxEVOdY1VBkmvcq3YKvfq5fF6D9mzUEQ2UbF4eoFWblfVvGf2GbutLw37crsN-ajwpi5FbNwcMD5WMKfjwOpgL3Vnc0ILIkeIanJvEVKbsTTRz06dMAxIudD/s1600/10257737_667679396613746_3777173959074570299_n.jpg
Deleteand that was by passengers carried :) by capacity they would have been even higher.
DeleteI know I'm asking for too much but would be great if we could see the entire list of European airlines and where they are at.
ReplyDeleteYes that would be cool
DeleteHere's the list from Wiki:
Deletehttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_largest_airlines_in_Europe
Croatia Airlines finally showing some life!
ReplyDeleteCroatia Airlines could be doing even better if they focused on connecting traffic through Zagreb instead of just feeding Star Alliance hubs.
DeleteBravo for Croatia.
DeleteI’m surprised to see both still behind some small carriers like Southwind and Luxair. Shows how competitive Europe really is.
ReplyDeleteAir Serbia is not behind Southwind and Luxair.
DeleteIs there going to be a winter schedule table published for each ex-yu airline, we always got articles like this at the start of the new season.
ReplyDeleteWhen is it expected than JU will announce new destinations?
ReplyDeletehttps://www.exyuaviation.com/2025/10/air-serbia-to-unveil-2026-expansion-in.html
DeleteThank you.
DeleteIt means that in a maximum month time we should know which new JU destinations will be introduced.
Yes, we should know soon
DeleteNice to see Air Serbia ahead of Discover Airlines and Aeroitalia. Those are not such small airlines.
ReplyDeleteEspecially Discovery
DeleteIt's Discover and their fleet size is the same as JU.
DeleteThe challenge for both is maintaining momentum.
ReplyDeleteOU will keep up momentum because it is adding planes. It will have 15 instead of 12. The issue is, they can't fill them.
DeleteDo you think others are not adding planes. Yes they do, and much more. So they will just lag behind more and more. 3 small planes over a decade, on the biggest ex-yu market where you keep 13 % market share is not enough, is ridiculous and is shameful. Except for Buzin and Središnjica fanboys
DeleteAir Montenegro “among Europe’s smallest airlines”. No surprise there. They need a serious strategy review.
ReplyDeleteIt is one of Europe's smallest countries and markets. What did you expect?
DeleteSingapore is one of the world's smallest countries and much smaller than Montenegro, yet its airline is one of the biggest ;)
DeleteIf Air Serbia’s capacity keeps growing like this, they’ll soon outgrow Belgrade Airport’s current infrastructure.
ReplyDeleteSMFH
DeleteIt's not smfh, the airport is already full during summer months even including de-icing stands.
DeleteIn an interview with Marek that was published here this summer, Marek said that in the morning wave JU aircraft take up all but 2 air bridge gates. So there are definitely constraints.
DeleteHe did say that.
Delete"Taking into account our wet-leased capacity this summer, we are already operating 37 aircraft. On some days, particularly during the morning peak, all gates up to A9 [at Belgrade Airport] are occupied by our aircraft, with additional ATRs parked on remote stands. There’s very limited space left, and it’s clear that the airport is starting to face congestion."
https://www.exyuaviation.com/2025/06/air-serbia-to-add-more-aircraft-looks.html
So how many countries are in Europe? This rank is not really some special success.
ReplyDeleteThe real comparison should be : Total situation in Yugoslavia at one moment before break up, let's say 1990 (all air traffic) compared to today (not just Serbia and Croatia,) including the huge success of PRN, Wizz Air actually performing the role of national flag carrier of Macedonia (sort of anyway...for a lot less money than the losses of real national airline) , Montenegro (what ever is the situation there) . There would be growth I'm sure. Then compare that growth to the 1990 to 2025 situation of Romania, Bulgaria, Greece...that would be a measure who has advanced more.
DeleteIf all those national airlines of the former Yugoslav republic are combined, it would be a lot more than former JAT ever was (even with Adria and Aviogenex included). And Wizz Air actually performs as sort of national flag carrier of Macedonia too. The total of all of that would be a lot more traffic than in former Yugoslavia. Tbh NOT BAD. I wish it was possible to do a more detailed comparison (before and after) for Bulgaria, Greece, Romania ...let's say in 1990 and 2025.
ReplyDeleteAirline traffic multiplied 10 times or more. Especially in Eastern Europe. Until 1990 numbers in Bulgaria and Romania were one tiny fraction, roughly speaking 10-20 percent of the numbers of Yugoslavia. Comparing with their growth, and not only their, but growth globally, entire ex-yu today lags behind big time. Because of war, of sanctions, of Mafias, of others overtaking our place and our passengers. Tražili ste, gledajte.
DeleteKudos to Ryanair. They are really out in front.
ReplyDeleteThank you for these numbers
ReplyDelete