Maximise your Avios, air miles and hotel points

Which airports are the winners and losers of the post-pandemic travel boom?

Links on Head for Points may support the site by paying a commission.  See here for all partner links.

As we headed into 2025, a flurry of emails from airport press offices hit my inbox with news of record passenger numbers.

Heathrow, Stansted, Manchester and others all crowed of reaching new highs and smashing pre-pandemic records. “London Stansted soars to new heights with record-breaking 2024” said one; “Heathrow ends record-breaking year with busiest December ever” said another.

Covid’s dampening effect on travel had, it seemed, well and truly come to an end. Or had it?

Which are the UK airport winners and losers of the post-pandemic travel boom?

Sometimes silence speaks louder than words. Whilst a handful of airports were celebrating, I knew others were languishing, stuck in a rut and unable to find a way out. The collapse in London City Airport’s numbers is widely known, but what about other airports?

I had to wait for the Civil Aviation Authority to publish full-year numbers for UK passenger airports before I could take a closer look, but the numbers are finally in. For this analysis, I have looked at passenger figures for the past ten years, from 2015 to 2024.

The winners

Let’s start with the winners. As I noted above, numerous UK airports smashed records for overall passenger numbers. Looking at data over the past seven years (from 2018 onwards), 12 airports reported their best performance in 2024:

  • Heathrow (83.9 million; previous high 80.9 million)
  • Manchester (30.8 million; previous high 29.4 million)
  • Stansted (29.7 million; previous high 28.1 million)
  • Edinburgh (15.8 million; previous high 14.7 million)
  • Bristol (10.7 million; previous high 9.9 million)
  • Belfast International (6.8 million; previous high 6.3 million)
  • Liverpool (5.1 million; previous high 5 million)
  • Leeds Bradford (4.2 million; previous high 4 million)
  • Bournemouth (1.1 million; previous high 950,000)
  • Sumburgh (290,000; previous high 270,000)
  • Teesside (230,000; previous high 226,000)
  • Biggin Hill (8,300; previous high 6,495)

Some of these are unsurprising. Heathrow easily beat its own low-balled forecasts and swept to a decisive 83.9 million passengers, approximately three million more than its previous record of 80.9 million in 2019.

Manchester and Stansted, both owned by Manchester Airports Group (MAG) also set new records. Although their overall figures are lower than Heathrow, they actually managed to grow at a faster rate; 4.7% compared to 2019 for Manchester and 5.5% for Stansted.

Which are the UK airport winners and losers of the post-pandemic travel boom?

Bristol appears to be doing very well, with steady growth over the past decade from 6.8 million in 2015 to 10.6 million in 2024, an increase of 56%. Belfast International recorded similar growth of 53%, to 6.8 million passengers, as has Bournemouth, from 705,000 a decade ago to 1.1 million in 2024 (a 54% increase).

Teesside International Airport (formerly Durham Tees Valley Airport) recorded the biggest ten-year growth of any airport on this list with a 62% rise in passenger numbers, albeit to a grand total of just 230,000!

Biggin Hill, which does not offer any regularly scheduled commercial flights, has gone from 644 passengers in 2015 to 8,300 in 2024. I assume this is down to increased use by private jets.

The losers

Not all airports have benefitted from the growth in passenger numbers. Whilst some are doing just fine, others are doing less well.

The biggest surprise on this list is Gatwick. It remains 7.8% down, with just 43.2 million passengers in 2024 versus 2019’s 46.6 million.

Overall available seats at Gatwick have reduced from 53.2 million in 2019 to 51.2 million in 2024, a reduction of 3.7%. This is less than the 7.8% reduction in bums on seats, so in addition to fewer seats being open for sale it appears that load factors have also gone down.

What is driving this? Virgin Atlantic accounts for just under 1 million of those missing passengers; it pulled out of the airport in 2020 and retrenched at Heathrow. Cirium data indicating that it offered 985,000 seats for sale during 2019.

British Airways has also not fully recovered its capacity at Gatwick. It offered just under two million fewer seats for sale in 2024 than it did in 2019: 7.3 million versus 9.3 million.

Other airlines have also come and gone. Norwegian, which pre-covid offered 5.7 million seats thanks to its extensive transatlantic network, has reduced by four fifths and now only fields 1.1 million seats, all of them short haul.

Meanwhile easyJet, Vueling and Tui have grown their schedules at Gatwick, helping to offset some of the losses.

Which are the UK airport winners and losers of the post-pandemic travel boom?

Other UK airports that remain down versus 2019 include Luton (-7%), Glasgow (-8.8%) and Newcastle (-1.1%).

MAG was unable to replicate its success at Stansted and Manchester with East Midlands. It remained down 11.6% versus 2019 and continues a trend that began before covid; passenger numbers peaked at the airport in 2017, at 4.9 million.

I’ve written about London City Airport’s struggles before, but these figures put it in stark focus. It remained down 30.2% over its 2019 figures, with just 3.6 million passengers.

Downward trends at a lot of smaller, regional airports in the UK have continued. Many of these have been charting steady declines over the past decade, even before covid.

Aberdeen and Belfast City both peaked in 2015 and have since slid down; a whopping 33.7% drop in Aberdeen’s case to 2.3 million passengers. I suspect reduced oil and gas demand is at play there.

Cardiff and Southampton have dropped below the million-passenger mark; Cardiff from 1.2 million in 2015 to 870,000 in 2024 whilst Southampton fell from 1.8 million to 850,000. Only time will tell whether the 164-metre runway extension will help there.

Conclusion

In broad terms, what appears to be happening is that airlines are consolidating capacity at some of the largest airports. 60% of the top 10 busiest airports posted record numbers in 2024, whilst smaller regional airports appear to be in decline.

What’s driving those changes? I can think of two possibilities.

The first is the ‘network effect’ of airports that can offer lots of connections, thus maximising the number of passengers they serve. The more connections you can offer the more passengers you can theoretically attract.

The second is that many airlines reduced the size of their fleets during covid and remain under-sized compared to 2019. Faced with a shortage of aircraft, they are prioritising flights to the busiest (ie. biggest) airports and where slots are scarce. Niche airports which may not be as profitable or competitive have been sidelined.

Whatever the reasons, it’s clear that not all airports are making a success of the post-covid environment despite an overall increase in passenger numbers in the UK.

With the post-covid recovery now largely complete, I suspect it will take a few more years to see how things settle. For now, Heathrow, Manchester and Stansted continue to beat pre-pandemic numbers, with all three setting new February records last month.

Category

General

Comments (97)

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

  • Greenpen says:
    17 Mar17 March 05:22

    I don’t see any mention of Birmingham. After LHR and LGW I probably use it the most. Always seems busy to me and just undergone quite a lot of new development.

    • SharonC says:
      17 Mar17 March 08:06

      You beat me to it. What is it about the media in general? They never mention the UK’s second biggest city!
      BHX has been growing massively too, albeit with a few hiccups

    • James Addiction says:
      17 Mar17 March 08:15

      Absolutely bizarre no mention of BHX.

      • Rhys says:
        17 Mar17 March 08:17

        Wasn’t anything interesting to say about it! It’s not a complete list of all UK airports.

        • ChrisBCN says:
          17 Mar17 March 08:48

          What is the uninteresting thing that you would have said about it if you would have said it?

        • BOSSMANTRAVELS says:
          17 Mar17 March 09:09

          It is bizarre Rhys…you say it’s not a complete list yet you mention the other 19 out of the top 20 airports by passenger numbers! Just for everyone else it’s 12.8m which is just a fraction short of the previous record year of 2017. Most notable reason for decrease was notable Flybe collapse.

          • ChrisBCN says:
            17 Mar17 March 09:11

            👍

          • Rhys says:
            17 Mar17 March 09:17

            The other 19 had notable things to refer to (or they set new records, so I listed them).

          • Panda Mick says:
            17 Mar17 March 09:42

            “Which airports are the winners and losers of the post-pandemic travel boom?”

            NOT

            “Which airports are the winners, losers and Birmingham of the post-pandemic travel boom?”

  • Tariq says:
    17 Mar17 March 05:59

    I think available seat numbers are an important consideration here, as you’ve considered in detail for Gatwick. The consequent load factors gives context to whether the rise or fall in passenger numbers is based on airline behaviour or consumer behaviour.

  • Dubious says:
    17 Mar17 March 06:13

    Don’t forget the collapse of Flybe happened in 2020; that airline helped a lot of the regional airports with some niche routes.
    The relatively low prices of some of these routes I think helped to stimulate some of the demand. No one is in a position to need to operate these routes today.

  • Andrew Hague says:
    17 Mar17 March 06:15

    Another problem is the excessive price rises that the likes of EasyJet and Jet2 have applied to regional departures. I live in Sheffield and quite often it’s a lot cheaper to fly BA from LHR rather than the local airports. Really hope they don’t price Doncaster out when it reopens( as happened previously ).

    • Novice says:
      17 Mar17 March 08:20

      Doncaster won’t do well. My prediction is they won’t attract any major airlines which will mean they will end up doing what they did before; only cater to the people who go to Spain and Greek islands for holidays and Polish/Bulgarians who go back home for a trip.

      To succeed, they need to attract flights with connections. Turkish Airlines and Emirates would be a start. And Iberia. It would give exposure to most destinations. They should also have a regular service to Lhr.

      • TooPoorToBeHere says:
        17 Mar17 March 08:48

        If LBA can’t sustain an LHR flight, DSA won’t either. And people would (with some limited degree of correctness) say “WTF, the ECML is right there…”

        Which is a shame because we found DSA a good little airport, rather like LPL.

        DSA isn’t *that* far from the originally-proposed eastern site for LBA if you squint.

        Funny old angle that runway’s at innit.

      • JMur says:
        17 Mar17 March 08:49

        I agree. EMA is only 50ish miles away and despite having daily 777 and 747F freight flights it’s never attracted interest from the major scheduled passenger carriers – BHX and MAN already have that sown up between them.

        • Chrisasaurus says:
          17 Mar17 March 09:06

          Well it’s also a pig to get to. Parking is sorta OK, albeit limited capacity but there’s no (practical) non-car way to get there

          • Dubious says:
            17 Mar17 March 13:55

            A bit like Doncaster then. I seem to remember that the only bus service to their terminal building went to the railway station…taking about 50 minutes but not running in coordination with the flight schedules. Subtract that from the ECML and you’ve lost a lot of advantage over a Heathrow routing.

            I flew there once from Jersey (on Flybe). Took me 20-30 minutes to walk to an alternative bus stop on a main road to head southbound.

  • Optimus Prime says:
    17 Mar17 March 06:20

    I also think that the Elizabeth line has made it a lot easier – and faster – for people in SE London to get to LHR than it used to be.

    • Talay says:
      17 Mar17 March 07:25

      £6 to drop off or pick up as off my visit last week. That’s an inflation busting 20% increase over the £5 it was previously.

      I don’t know when it happened but I do know that that the car parking has gone up to £11.50 for 30 to 44 minutes.

      Absolute robbery.

      • Andrew. says:
        17 Mar17 March 08:35

        You can still drop off (and pick up) at the Long Stay for 30 minutes for nothing.

      • JDB says:
        17 Mar17 March 10:46

        The increase to £6 (making it the same as LGW) was in fact in line with inflation. The money collected goes towards the passenger service charges.

      • TH says:
        17 Mar17 March 15:42

        It’s £7 to drop off at Stansted. Fortunately it only costs me 50p with my local residents’ pass!

  • Bagoly says:
    17 Mar17 March 06:28

    That picture of Gatwick North Terminal has a Norwegian wide-body, presumably a 787, so pre 2021.

    The picture is also rotated about 140′ from the map view!

  • Mark says:
    17 Mar17 March 06:38

    At one point there were rumours that Aberdeen airport was looking to extend the runway to get wide body jets direct from Houston and other major oil and gas hubs. Very unlikely we will see that now!

    • Owen Rudge says:
      17 Mar17 March 07:20

      Yes, with the state of the O&G industry now compared with the early 2010s, I doubt ABZ will see a return to those passenger numbers in the foreseeable future. Losing routes like CDG and FRA hasn’t helped of course, and AMS is mainly served by Embraers now rather than 737s (though still maintains excellent frequency).

      • Martin says:
        17 Mar17 March 09:47

        A problem with ABZ is that management are focussed on the big oil money. Now that market has shrunk, they don’t seem capable of competing with EDI down the road. Sky-high car parking costs are pushing passengers south. Same thing with longish waits for bags as bigger airports. Security hassles, way worse than GLA or EDI. Complaints by passengers are met with a take it or leave it attitude. The management at ABZ need to focus on it being an affordable, friendly local airport to help traffic recover.

  • NigelthePensioner says:
    17 Mar17 March 06:52

    I find it quite funny that you have quite rightly completely ignored BHX which right minded travellers do.
    Since some “bright” spark had the amazing idea of removing the escalators between check in and departures and replacing them with 2 giant lifts (whose doors open and close until it is full – moving nowhere in the meantime), the queues to get into the airport have been record breaking!!
    Possibly some are still queuing since Covid moved on!

    • James Addiction says:
      17 Mar17 March 08:14

      It’s not as bad now. Last Summer BHX was a disaster and all linked to the problems they had with the their new security area and the last min u-turn the government made regarding 100ml liquid rules – it paralysed them.
      But its been ironed out somewhat now, at least the 3 trips I have taken there this year have been very smooth indeed. The lifts weren’t a problem at all. We’ll have to see in the Summer but I understand further security lanes have been added with more planned.
      It’s still a building site though with no end in sight from what I can tell.

    • SharonC says:
      17 Mar17 March 08:14

      You’re right those lifts are crap….all four of them. However, I’d sooner fly from BHX than BRS my local (where the car parks and entry/exit are a mess, and getting there through country roads is gridlocked, plus its mostly low cost/holiday airlines), or trek 3hrs to LHR!
      That’s not the point. Why miss out an airport who only last month had their busiest February half-term on record with a 20% increase in pax

      • James Addiction says:
        17 Mar17 March 08:17

        The lifts aren’t an issue at all, not recently anyway. There’s 4 not 2. And I have no idea what the poster above means about the doors opening and closing lol

        • ChrisBCN says:
          17 Mar17 March 08:55

          Not sure why several of you are saying the lifts are better because they are ok now. The lifts have a limited capacity, which is high enough to cope with winter demand. However, it is NOT enough capacity to cope with peak summer demand. I’m still hoping that there will be a staircase opened….

          • James Addiction says:
            17 Mar17 March 09:01

            My recent experience is that they have been fine. Half term week no problems and very smooth. Peak time of day too. Like I said previously proof will be in the Summer pudding however. But the huge queues that were (rightly) plastered all over the media last year when the new security wing was opened are unlikely to happen again this year.

            But totally agree, a staircase or escalator again would be nice!

      • BOSSMANTRAVELS says:
        17 Mar17 March 14:12

        +1 for the lifts being rubbish

    • Throwawayname says:
      17 Mar17 March 09:59

      BHX is absolutely fine 95% of the time. As long as you avoid the early morning (pre-0900) departures in peak summer, you’re virtually guaranteed a positive experience. There’s not a lot the airport can realistically do in order to improve the experience of those who do travel on those peak services, as it’d have to involve a huge investment in infrastructure which would almost certainly end up being doomed to perennial underutilisation.

    • JDB says:
      17 Mar17 March 10:32

      I don’t know about BHX but as at LHR T3 where lifts have replaced escalators, it’s a question of space. Escalators are inefficient in that regard.

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

New to Head for Points?

Welcome!  We’re the UK’s most-read source of business travel, Avios, frequent flyer and hotel loyalty news. Let us improve how you travel. Got any questions? Ask them in our forums.

Get 25,000 Avios with the Barclaycard Avios Plus Mastercard

GET A SIGN-UP BONUS OF 18,000 VIRGIN POINTS!

Latest Forum Posts

Get 80,000 bonus points (worth 80,000 Avios) and £400 of dining credit with The Platinum Card (Offer ends 27th May)

Check reward flight availability instantly for free!

See a whole year of reward seat availability on one page at SeatSpy.com

Get up to 10,000 bonus Hilton Honors points

Booking a luxury hotel?

Our luxury hotel booking service offers you GUARANTEED extra benefits over booking direct. Works with Four Seasons, Mandarin Oriental, The Ritz Carlton, St Regis and more. We've booked £1.7 million of rooms to date. Click for details.

SME? GET THE ONLY FREE SMALL BUSINESS CREDIT CARD WHICH CAN EARN AVIOS

Get points worth 30,000 Avios with 'first year free' American Express Gold (ends 27th May)

The UK's biggest frequent flyer website uses cookies, which you can block via your browser settings. Continuing implies your consent to this policy. Our privacy policy is here.

Got it!