Hong Kong-Taipei is the busiest international flight route, according to a report released Tuesday by aviation intelligence company OAG.
The route — which last held that position in 2019 — again tops the list despite seat capacity remaining 15% below pre-pandemic levels, according to OAG’s report.
Seven of the 10 busiest international routes in the world are in Asia-Pacific, though seat capacity on many of those routes still haven’t recovered to 2019 levels.
However, two routes on the list — both in the Middle East — show significant growth since 2019. The second busiest route, Cairo to Jeddah, has around 5.5 million available seats, which is 62% higher than 2019 levels, according to OAG.
The third busiest route — Seoul Incheon to Tokyo Narita — also showed significant growth (68%) from pre-pandemic levels. Several factors explain why, said John Grant, chief analyst at OAG.
“Firstly, with the Chinese international market still slowly recovering, airlines have had to allocate aircraft to other markets. And Japan is a very popular destination at the moment,” he said. “On top of that … a few new carriers have entered the market, including airlines such as Eastar and Air Japan. And finally … Haneda airport is effectively full so that new capacity has had to go to Narita.”
The route linking Kuala Lumpur and Singapore, which was the busiest international route of 2023, moved to fourth place, with seats 3% below 2019 levels. Bangkok to Hong Kong, the seventh busiest route, is also not fully restored, remaining 13% behind pre-pandemic capacity.
New York-JFK to London-Heathrow is the only route on the top 10 list that touches down in North America and Europe. Seat capacity on the route rose 3% last year, reaching 4 million seats, according to OAG.
Flights from Latin America did not make the top 10 list, but OAG says the busiest international route in the region is the one that links Orlando, Florida, to San Juan, Puerto Rico, with 2.3 million seats.
Busiest domestic routes
Domestic flight routes are far busier than international ones, in terms of the volume of scheduled seats.
The busiest route in the world is in South Korea, linking Seoul to the island of Jeju. Some 14.2 million seats were available on the route in 2024, amounting to around 39,000 seats per day, according to OAG.
And that’s despite capacity on the route still being 19% below pre-pandemic levels, the company said.
According to the report, nine of the ten busiest domestic airline routes of 2024 are in Asia-Pacific.
The route linking Hokkaido to Tokyo comes in at No. 2, followed by another route in Japan — one connecting the city of Fukuoka to Tokyo Haneda.
China’s busiest airline route connects its two largest cities — Beijing to Shanghai — with some 7.7 million seats, just ahead of the 7 million seats that fly between Guangzhou to Shanghai.
Seats on the latter route fell from 2023 levels, according to OAG, in what Grant called a “readjustment” to 2019 schedules.
“During the pandemic, the local Chinese airlines redirected … international capacity to domestic services, and this route saw a large increase,” he said. “What we are seeing now is the realignment of capacity back to more normal levels as the Chinese carriers slowly return more international services.”
The largest growth on this list is in Saudi Arabia, with seats on the route connecting Jeddah and Riyadh increasing 9% from 2019.
Busiest domestic routes by region
The busiest route in Africa links South Africa’s Cape Town to Johannesburg (5 million seats) and in Europe, Spain’s Barcelona to the island of Mallorca (2.9 million seats).
The busiest route in the United States connects Atlanta and Orlando (3.5 million seats), but the busiest route in North America is the one in Canada that links Vancouver and Toronto (3,498,835 seats).
