NEWS FLASH
Belgrade Airport handled 600.348 passengers in January, representing an increase of 6.5% year-on-year, or an additional 36.655 travellers. The figure was achieved despite significant disruptions caused by fog and snow at the start of the month, which resulted in the cancellation of a number of flights. The airport is on course for another month of passenger growth in February, with capacity levels projected to increase 10.3%.
Belgrade’s largest airlines by scheduled seat capacity, January 2026


9.5 million this year
ReplyDeleteYes, you wish. It will go far beyond 10 million
DeleteWhy the belief the comment at 18:06 was a critique? Dont be so thin-skinned ffs
Delete+1
DeleteFor BEG to reach 10 million this year it needs a 11.22% increase.
9.5 million is a very respectable achievement and it needs a 6.6% increase in passenger traffic. It would be tough to achieve that rate during summer but hopefully larger increases in the shoulder season can make up the difference.
Is there an info how many pax JU carried in January?
ReplyDeleteWould be great knowing that. I presume around 300k, 50% of BEG
DeleteVery bad loading factor representing 600.333 of 810.129!
ReplyDeleteThe airport did not have 810.000 seats in January. As mentioned multiple times, capacity levels constantly change as airlines change frequencies and equipment on a regular basis.
DeleteEven if it had 810.000 seats that is LF of about 74% which is totally okay for January. In this month only couple days in the beginning are good, other days are always bad in terms of demand.
DeleteAirport has record January, posts growth of 6.5% but there is always that one idiot to say "VERY BAD" lol
DeleteFor reference see the article https://www.exyuaviation.com/2025/12/most-ex-yu-capital-airports-to-start.html
DeleteAs mentioned multiple times, capacity levels change, especially in a month which had significant operational disruptions across the continent, resulting in numerous cancelled flights The airport had 800.583 seats.
DeleteNo internet search is needed to figure out who is using VERY BAD expression to describe JU&BEG. His comments are like fertilizer. It smells bad but the more he, to put it mildly, fertilizes, the bigger BEG and JU grow!
Delete@admin Understand capacity changes, but 10.000 seats less than planned is not so small change. Dou you maybe have data which airline generated the biggest capacity change, and also how many flights were cancelled and that are not influenced by bad weather. Thanks in advance
Delete10.000 out of 810.000 is just 1.2% less. You are welcome!
DeleteIf Belgrade airport load factor is so bad I wonder how other airports in the region are doing
DeleteZagreb had a load factor of 70% in January much worse than belgrade
DeleteSince when is 75% during off season a bad LF? It's around a year round average for some airlines...
DeleteActually, it's far much better than some airlines' year round average
DeleteMaybe it wouldn't be bad to always add what the capacity was like during the month. It would really help us out.
DeleteI think that actual pax includes charter pax while scheduled capacity does not, but I'm not sure. Also not much relevant for January...
Delete600k in January? Not too bad. For comparison, 10 years ago Belgrade Airport had 290.580 passengers in Jan 2016. Now it's more than double. Congrats BEG!
ReplyDeleteZAG had 296.861 passengers this January, less than half of BEG.
DeleteCrazy especially since OU had a lot of extra seats on offer.
DeleteZagreb is realistically 10 years behind Belgrade when it comes to passenger numbers. Which is staggering considering where the two were 12 years ago.
DeleteAnd then you can check it 35 years ago... That's the business dynamics influenced by factors out of market. Don't understand why is that strange or unexpected.
DeleteRealistically, it's not realistic to compare BEG and ZAG like that, quantitatively.
DeleteBeing 10 years behind in terms of passenger numbers, implies a possibility of someday catching up, and we all know (or should know) that ain't happening due to the larger geographical context.
Population of Zagreb is 800k. Population of Belgrade is 1.2 million.
Greater Zagreb, as in the entire urban agglomeration, has 1.08 million people.
Belgrade has 1.7 million.
In addition to that, the 2nd largest city in Serbia - Novi Sad, with a population of over 300k, is a stone's throw away from Belgrade. This means; these two cities alone have 2 million people i.e. more than double the entire population of Croatia.
Couple that with the fact that Serbia itself has got almost double the population of Croatia, with 2 functional international airports, whereas significantly smaller Croatia has 7 of them - 4 or 5 of which are not trivially small. In fact 3 of them have over 3 million annual passengers and when you see this wider context, then...common, what are we even talking about?!
Now, if we compare BEG and ZAG qualitatively, that's a whole different ball game - one with merit. In that case, I would say: BEG is objectively a better airport. It's a better run airport, functioning as a mini hub, with proper waves in terms of the flight schedule, with the only serious flag carrier in former Yugoslavia...and beyond, with something happening all the time in terms of the works on improving the airport and so on.
My main point tho is: even in the optimal situation, with Croatia Airlines getting its sh*t together and with a better management, ZAG still wouldn't get even close to BEG. In my opinion.
With all of these other airports in Croatia and everything else, I think ZAG has a potential for some 10 million annual pax in the next 20 years or so. Maybe.
On the other hand, BEG has potential for 20 million in the same timeframe. Easy.
@EX-YU Aviation how many passengers Tuzla have in january?
ReplyDeleteFor BEG it is a very promising start!
ReplyDeleteWould the 10 Mio mark be reachable in 2026 or 2027 is more realistic?
It would be interesting if the data are available not only to have the seats that were on offer but also the pax carried by airline.
Мислим да је 10 милиона још недостижно. Аеродром би морао да генерише раст од око 15% што није реално. Ја лично очекујем између 9.6 и 9.8 милиона.
Delete^^ nice to see January getting off to a good start.
ReplyDeleteGreat news is that Royal Jordanian further boosted capacity to BEG. One one day they even plan to send the A321neo. I think they have the A320neo on 6-7 flights until the end of June.
ReplyDeletePlus they loaded winter flights into the system.
DeleteJU needs Middle East strategy, they had not so long ago Tel Aviv, Beirut, Cairo, Abu Dhabi, even this Amman in pipeline...
DeleteJU's middle East strategy is to feed TK in IST.
DeleteI don't think it will serve that region other than LCA with its own metal for the foreseeable future.
RJ is on an expansion mode across Europe!
DeleteThey just announced SKG as well. Very good airline.
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