ACI World released final 2025 data confirming that air travel is approaching 10 billion passengers worldwide
Montreal, 15 July 2026 – In 2025, global air travel reached 9.8 billion passengers, bringing the industry closer than ever to the 10 billion-passenger threshold, according to the 2026 ACI World Airport Traffic Dataset released today by Airports Council International (ACI) World. Covering passenger traffic, air cargo volumes, and aircraft movements, the dataset confirms that aviation continues to expand, while the global landscape of the airports driving that growth is evolving.
The dataset, which covers 2,817 airports across more than 180 countries and territories, shows that global passenger traffic rose 3.7% over 2024 and 6.5% above 2019 levels. The world’s 20 busiest airports handled 1.59 billion passengers, representing 16% of all air travellers globally. Asia-Pacific airports led the year’s ranking shifts, driven by infrastructure investment, connectivity improvements, and surging tourism demand. (....)