Dubai International airport has published its traffic figures for 2023, with the number of passengers surpassing 2019 levels.
The hub welcomed a total of 86,994,365 customers last year, a 31.7 per cent increase on 2022, and higher than the 86,396,757 travellers who passed through the airport in pre-pandemic 2019.
The figure was driven by growth in the second half of 2023, with 45.4 million customers recorded. August was the busiest month of the year with 7.9 million passengers, followed by December with 7.8 million.
However the figure is not actually a record for Dubai International – the airport welcomed over 88 million passengers in 2017 and more than 89 million passengers in 2018.
The hub said that early projections showed its 2024 traffic will reach 88.8 million – just shy of the overall annual record.
India saw the most traffic from the airport last year with around 11.9 million customers, while in terms of cities London retained the top spot with 3.7 million passengers, followed by Riyadh (2.6 million) and Mumbai (2.5 million).
Last month Dubai’s flag carrier Emirates said it was experiencing “a surge in forward bookings to and from UK” over the next 12 months, with destinations including London and Glasgow faring particularly well.
London and Glasgow set to be Emirates’ most popular UK inbound gateways in 2024
Commenting on the news Paul Griffiths, CEO of Dubai Airports, said:
“I am incredibly proud of everyone at Dubai International, for their dedication and relentless pursuit of excellence, which has propelled us to break many of our own records. 2023 was an exceptional year and is a testament to our unwavering commitment to operational excellence, efficiency, innovation and delivering exemplary guest experience.
“This translated to DXB achieving its highest internal engagement scores – a reflection of our commitment to fostering a collaborative culture, where every contribution is valued and every employee is empowered to their full potential.
“I want to express my gratitude to our dedicated team, the heartbeat of our organisation, and to our partners whose, collaborative work was instrumental in achieving these milestones.
“Looking ahead, we’re renewing our commitment to collectively enhance the airport experience for our all our guests by launching significant projects to refurbish facilities at DXB and fortify our infrastructure for future growth. DXB remains firmly positioned as a global leader, setting the gold standard for exceptional guest experiences and international aviation excellence.”
Dubai recently announced that it welcomed a record 17.15 million international overnight visitors in 2023, surpassing the 16.73 million visitors registered in 2019.
