Domestic air traffic sees highest ever growth in H1 2024

The first six months of 2024 (January-June) have seen the highest ever domestic air traffic with airlines flying 79.3 million passengers.

In the same period last year airlines flew 76 million passengers. This accounts for 4.2 per cent year on year traffic growth. Traffic flown in the first six months in 2024 was higher than 2019 which had similarly witnessed 70.6 million passengers.

Go First's closure last May had led to a 5.5 per cent month-on-month decline in traffic in June. This year the month-on-month drop in traffic was 4.2 per cent in June - the figures being lower than May as it has one extra day.

"Passenger traffic is consistently increasing this year. It's not one month phenomenon. While year on year number of daily departures have grown by 2.5 per cent, traffic has grown by 4.2 per cent indicating higher loads," said Ameya Joshi, founder of aviation blog Network Thoughts.

In June carriers transported 13.2 million passengers with an average load factor of over 88 per cent.

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IndiGo retained its number one ranking with 60.8 per cent share of domestic traffic. While IndiGo's market share declined month on month, Air India's share rose from 13.7 per cent to 14.6 per cent in June. SpiceJet's share fell to 3.8 per cent - the lowest in six months.

SpiceJet also reported the worst on-time performance with only 46.1 per cent on time flights. Akasa Air saw the highest punctuality with 79.5 per cent on time flights at four metro airports.

Mumbai airport registered 7 per cent growth in traffic in April June quarter handling 13.46 million passengers. Dubai maintained its top position among international destinations. Delhi, Bengaluru and Hyderabad retained the position as the top 3 domestic destinations exceeding 6.9 million passenger count over a period of 3 months.