Zagreb Airport has registered another record year, with most routes showing significant passenger growth on 2023. Data from the statistical office of the European Union, Eurostat, shows that Ryanair has been a major driving force behind the airport's surge in the three quarters of the year, while other airlines continue their post-pandemic recovery. Ryanair's leisure-focused routes, especially those to Malta and Malaga, have performed strongly, with passenger numbers increasing by 78% and 99% respectively year-on-year. The budget carrier’s busiest route out of Zagreb remains London Stansted, which is now outperforming the London Heathrow service, maintained by both Croatia Airlines and British Airways, by over 22.700 travellers.
Lufthansa Group hubs served from Zagreb are still trailing behind their pre-pandemic performance, with some even experiencing lower passenger numbers compared to last year. Notably, routes to both Frankfurt and Vienna have seen softer figures. Meanwhile, flights to Brussels have seen a significant drop in passenger numbers, halving compared to 2019. Croatia Airlines’ performance on the route has been hit by Ryanair’s competing operations to Charleroi, as well as Brussels Airlines' exit. Additionally, the flag carrier’s service to another Lufthansa Group hub, Zurich, has also seen a decrease, with passenger numbers down by 27% on 2019 levels.
T’Way Air, which launched operations to Zagreb this summer, operating its outbound service with a technical stop in Bishkek and its inbound flight nonstop, handled 33.380 passengers. Its high-density 347-seat Airbus A330-300 aircraft saw an average cabin load factor of 81.5%. Pegasus Airlines, which entered the Croatian market this January, welcomed 27.422 travellers, registering an average load factor of 76.2% over the three quarters.
The table below, indicates passenger numbers for the majority of Zagreb’s scheduled destinations, although not all. The figures in the table account for just over 91% of Zagreb’s total passenger numbers in the first three quarters of 2024.
Zagreb Airport's passenger performance for select routes, Q1 - Q3 2024
Why are so many routes below 2019?
ReplyDeleteI think Ryanair is impacting a lot of routes.
DeleteLH’s result is directly influenced by good results of KLM and TK.
DeleteIt's because people no longer have to transfer to get to places. Ryanair now offers direct links.
DeletePlus people are afraid of strikes at LH
DeleteThe German government is actively trying to reduce the number of people traveling by air.
DeleteNaturally LH is impacted the most by this policy.
Just my2cents
I think in ZAG it's more about people no longer needing to transfer. Also don't forget that this summer there was a nonstop flight to Berlin.
DeleteAnd also AC Rouge operated YYZ alongside TS in 2019.
DeleteInteresting numbers. Surprised how much growth Amsterdam has seen. I'm guessing thanks to KLM.
ReplyDeleteKLM positioned itself very well during Covid.
DeleteYeah exactly, KLM and Amsterdam have in large part replaced Frankfurt over the last 4 years.
DeleteI'm more surprised by Iberia's huge growth on the Madrid route. Part of it must be transfer related, right?
Spain in general is very popular; Madrid, Barcelona, Girona, Palma, Malaga...
If ZAG didn't bring FR, it would have been in trouble.
ReplyDeleteThat's why that brought them.
DeleteThe trouble for having brought them is yet to come.
DeleteJust give it time. Things need time to rot.
The capacity per airline may not have returned to 2019 levels.
ReplyDeleteIt seems to have returned in most other markets in the region.
Delete🤣🤣
DeleteThe difference between Ryanair's Stansted flights and OU/BA's LLHR flights keeps getting bigger and bigger.
ReplyDeleteYes, it has been Ryanair's busiest route from Zagreb from the start.
DeletePlus FR keeps on adding more and more flights. They are not kidding, they are in for a kill.
DeleteNot really. Next summer London is no longer Ryanair's sole busiest route.
DeleteWhat do you mean sole busiest route? There can only be one busiest route.
DeleteStarting next summer, the busiest route is Malta. Not Stansted. Malta has 11pw frequency.
DeleteOh wow let's see if it overtakes FRA
DeleteWho is flying to Malta? All tourism or what?
DeleteDidn't mean for my above comment to sound passive aggressive :D Genuinely interested in type of passengers on flights to Malta.
Delete^ I'd say mostly tourism for sure, but also Maltese economy has been the fastest growing one in the EU, with Croatia being the 2nd fastest, so it's possible that there has been some business travel too.
DeleteAnyway, it might not be all tourism, but tourism does account for most of the traffic.
I think Croatian people are definitely traveling more with Ryanair around. Good job. Although these numbers show what a poor job Croatia Airlines is doing.
ReplyDeleteI thought this is because Slovenians traveling from Zagreb. :-)
DeleteThey definitely help.
DeleteOf course they do, look at the car plates at ZAG
DeleteIt's a well accepted "fact" of this blog that ZAG mainly caters to Slovenian travellers! 😉
DeleteThere are also people like you who ignore Slovenes who make up a large number of passengers. EK isn't coming back to ZAG now that FZ flies to LJU. What does that tell us?
DeleteEK left Zagreb long before flyDubai was in Ljubljana 👍🏼
DeleteThat's why they never came back, they see how well LJU does for them.
Deletedefine well, the LF is meh
DeleteExcellent job and statistics! :)
ReplyDeleteGreat to see LOT doing well.
ReplyDeleteWow Belgrade had almost as many passengers as Madrid. Way to go JU!
ReplyDeleteNot necessary a good thing. Madrid, who is to Ex-Yu market kinda exotic destination, has more pax than Belgrade with large number of Croats in Belgrade, and Serbs in Zagreb. Plus Madrid has no diaspora...
DeleteBEG should have four times more passengers than MAD.
DeleteWhy? No one from BEG uses ZAG to transfer anywhere. Point to point traffic is limited. Route is mostly used by transfers from ZAG via BEG.
DeleteAnon 16:08, sorry, but your comment doesn't make sense
DeleteAir Serbia is one of the most successful legacy carriers out of ZAG but yeah, the fact that Iberia has surpassed them both compared to 2019. and even more so compared to 2023., means JU can and definitely should do better.
DeleteAegean is doing very well too and so is LOT, but KLM, Turkish and Iberia are crushing it.
I was expecting Pegasus to be busier tbh. Does not seem to have impacted Turkish Airlines in the slightest.
ReplyDeleteTK killing it as usual
DeleteWe like TK.
DeleteTK should really start Split, at least seasonally.
DeleteOU is operating that route.
DeleteQuite successfully I might add
DeleteWould be interesting to see the load factors too.
ReplyDeleteWhy is Vienna so impacted?
ReplyDeleteAustrian was using ATRs this summer
DeletePlus with FR booming in ZAG there is less need to connect. VIE is the weakest hub so it is the first to be impacted. OS keeps on cutting flights.
DeleteBravo Hrvatska!
ReplyDeleteSo when airports are combined Frankfurt is numbers 1, then Istanbul and London.
ReplyDeleteStansted is nowhere near London. It costs much more then the Air fare for the train journey into central London.
DeleteDon't get why ZRH does not work in bigger number from ZAG. Swiss couldn't make it either.
ReplyDeleteIt's mostly P2P traffic, I haven't heard anyone transfering via Zurich
Delete^ZRH is actually a great hub to transfer west...
DeleteWell done Ryanair!
ReplyDeleteLiterally driving 90% of Zagreb's growth.
DeleteAny problem?
DeleteNot yet. It's called monopsony. When you only have one significant client. Wait. The passenger numbers are going to be better and better for Ryan and revenue for Zagreb worse and worse.
DeleteAll of Lufthansa hubs are down compared to 2019.
ReplyDeleteFrom what I am seeing with my friends and colleagues, KLM has taken over a significant portion of connecting passengers from Zagreb. Their fares are very competitive - unless you are flying just to Amsterdam.
DeleteLufthansa is extremely expensive and the biggest problem of all is that there are no short connections possible on the way back to Zagreb from North America. There are no Frankfurt-Zagreb flights for hours.
DeleteKLM is reducing capacity to ZAG this summer. Time for OU to react.
DeleteKL faces major issues with the Dutch government wishing to reduce passengers connecting in AMS.
DeleteYes but in BEG they are increasing capacity already this winter.
DeleteKLM has the same schedule and capacity to Zagreb this year as it did last year
DeleteNope, B737 only operated once per week this year
DeleteThat is simply incorrect lol. Just plain right incorrect
DeleteZagreb 14x 737 over summer, unlike Belgrade E190 :)
DeleteHaving more capacity to a hub is not the flex you think it is. It just means your direct connectivity is much worse.
DeleteSpot on dude! Zagreb should ask to get its capacity reduced smh
Delete🤣🤣🤣
DeleteInteresting to see busiest routes. No major surprises among them really.
ReplyDeleteRyanair is becoming more and more dominant and has obviously had an impact on a lot of routes. Not sure how smart of a strategy it will be in the long run but we will see.
ReplyDeleteI think Ryanair barely has a third of all passengers and it is still not the number 1airline so I don't know how you can see it as dominant.
DeleteI think Ryanair is already number 1 by passengers carried at ZAG.
DeleteOU is holding strong only because of PSO routes and domestic traffic. Look at the numbers to places they fly to. Horrible.
DeleteThese figures mean Croatia Airlines is nowhere near to getting close to pre Covid passenger numbers in Zagreb which is a disaster considering most airlines have surpassed those figures.
ReplyDeleteI assume that if there were no FR, Croatia Airlines would not have retreated so much from Zagreb.
DeleteAll problems will be magically solved with A220s. Trust Jasmin.
DeleteAnd people said I'm a h8er when I said that OU is done. These numbers and their financials are proof enough.
Delete@Admin, What is happening with t'Way in Zagreb? Will they fly in 2025?
ReplyDeleteIt's not in their summer schedule and Zagreb has been removed from the website as a destination. Make of that what you will.
DeleteYes, they are expected to fly to Zagreb in 2025.
DeleteWill be interesting to see if T'Way comes back next year. So far it's not looking good.
ReplyDeleteTheir LF from the article is also not good since it's a high density plane.
DeleteActually I remember this very site quoting a Korean tour operator when the route launched that said demand is lower than expected at 80% loads because of unpopular stop in Bishkek. Analiticar and self proclaimed expert along with his patsy Foglar took that info said it was made up, and wrote a whole article insulting this site. So much for that.
DeleteThanks for the numbers
ReplyDeleteRyanair's Beauvais does not seem to have impacted Paris CDG route
ReplyDelete^ But it's down over 10% compared to 2019
DeleteThe only reason it's not below 2023 numbers is because of Olympics.
DeleteCroatia did really well in the Olympics so there was crazy high demand
DeleteRYANAIR... Da ga nema, valjalo bi ga izmisliti :-)
ReplyDeleteZAG je najbolji primer šta znači FR, pogotovo kad im se dopusti da neometano rade svoj posao i šire mrežu destinacija, pa još ako nemaju direktnu konkurenciju (a u Zagrebu praktično nemaju konkurenciju u lcc segmentu), tu ne može da bude promašaj.
Pogoto je impresivan Ryanov učinak na liniji London-Stansted,
*da završim prethodni post... Stansted ima više putnika nego Croatia i British zajedno, na liniji za Hitrou. To samo govori da "legacy" prevoznici očigledno negde greše (verovatno su skupi) i da London može da privuče mnogo više turista na p2p osnovi, nego što ima transfera preko aerodroma Hitrou. Croatia i British uglavnom pecaju transferne putnike, to im je primarna ciljna grupa na ovoj liniji.
Delete+1
DeleteI wonder how many passengers on the LH hub routes are carried by Lufthansa and how many by Croatia Airlines
ReplyDeleteSo Frankfurt is number 1 destination from Zagreb and Ljubljana, Istanbul is from Belgrade. I'm guessing Istanbul is also numbers 1 from Sarajevo and Skopje. Belgrade is number 1 from Podgorica.
ReplyDeleteI love this kinds of statistics. Thank you
ReplyDeleteThanks for the numbers. Very cool to have them in one place.
ReplyDeleteSo PUY 20k, hopefully not combined w ZAD.
ReplyDeleteStop spoiling this victory for Croatia Airlines with this insistance on details.
ReplyDeleteReally nice! :)
ReplyDelete