Commercial airports across the former Yugoslavia handled a combined total of 1.733.335 passengers during the first month of the year. Among them, Belgrade positioned itself within the top 65 busiest in Europe, while Pristina Airport also made it within the top 100. A number of airports registered their busiest January on record, however, some fell short of both last year’s result, as well as that of the pre-pandemic 2019. Belgrade, Pristina, Zagreb, Skopje, Podgorica, Sarajevo, Ohrid, Zadar and Kraljevo posted record numbers. Notably, Skopje Airport saw its figures jump 50.5% on last year, as well as 50.9% on the pre-pandemic 2019. On the other hand, Split, Niš, Banja Luka, Tuzla, and Osijek handled fewer travellers than in January last year. While Dubrovnik’s figures saw an improvement on 2023, they were still down over 40% on 2019.
Passenger performance by airport, January 2024
During January, Belgrade Airport ranked 65th busiest on the continent, just behind Tirana, Naples, and Seville, but ahead of Sofia, Toulouse, and Bristol. Pristina positioned itself as the 97th busiest, behind Vilnius and Tbilisi and in front of Trondheim and Stavanger in Norway. Zagreb took 104th place. It was behind the likes of Pisa, Cagliari, and Wroclaw, but ahead of Hanover and Skopje, which itself ranked 106th. The Macedonian capital outperformed Tromso in Norway, London City, and Tallinn. During the first month of the year, the Macedonian market was the second-fastest growing in Europe, increasing its overall figures by 47.1%. It was behind only Albania with 51.2% growth. In contrast, the market in Bosnia and Herzegovina saw the biggest year-on-year decline in Europe, contracting 23.4%.
Rank of select European airports by passenger numbers in the region
The majority of European markets saw growth during the first month of the year compared to 2023. In addition to Bosnia and Herzegovina, the exceptions were Russia, Moldova, Sweden and the Netherlands. Olivier Jankovec, the Director General of Airports Council International Europe, said, “Demand generally remained resilient in the face of much increased air fares, even though the growth dynamic slowed down or even stalled in a few markets. This is adding further divergences to an already much fragmented airport market, where geopolitics and structural aviation market changes – including the primacy of leisure demand and selective low cost carrier expansion – are shaping traffic performance like never before”. London Heathrow was Europe’s busiest airport in January, with 6.004.801 passengers, just ahead of Istanbul’s main gateway with 5.996.416 travellers. They were followed by Paris, Madrid, Amsterdam Frankfurt, Barcelona, Istanbul Sabiha Gokcen, Rome and Munich.
Largest airlines by scheduled seat capacity across the former Yugoslavia, January 2024
