Business 21 January 2026, 1:44pm

Nearly 20 million passengers passed through Budapest Airport in 2025

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Budapest's Liszt Ferenc International Airport handled almost 20 million passengers in 2025, an increase of 11.7% over 2024. This follows a nearly 20% annual growth one year earlier, as revealed by Budapest Airport's report on Wednesday.

About 1.65 million passengers were handled at Budapest Airport in December 2025, 10,3% more than in the last month of 2024. Passenger traffic was hovering between 1.3 and 1.9 million throughout 2025, and Budpest Airport

handled 19,632,894 passengers last year, which corresponds to a 11.7% increase over 2024.

This growth was supported by the fact that last year, 45 airlines offered flights to 154 destinations, with greater seating capacity than in previous years.

In addition to passenger traffic, the cargo business grew significantly in 2025. Cargo traffic totalled 37,360 tonnes in December, which corresponds to a 35% year-on-year increase. The cargo volume increased from 300,000 tonnes in 2024 to over 400,000 tonnes last year. Budapest Airport closed the year with a total of 426,519 tonnes, representing a 42.3% increase on the previous year. This result has established Budapest Airport as the main distribution centre in the region.

The graph below shows that, understandably given the lockdowns, the coronavirus pandemic put a serious dent in passenger traffic. However, the volume of cargo flown diminished only moderately and quickly recovered. (At this point, we should note that the acquisition of Budapest Airport had a detrimental impact on transparency. All of the airport's previous publications, including detailed reports on traffic, have become unavailable. It took some serious digging to find the date for the longer time series. Also, if you look for past press releases on the site, you're in for a surprise. Try "airport bulletin", for instance. The hits are all over the place, there's no chronological order.)

The chart below shows the annual number of passengers alongside a curve representing the average number of passengers over the five years prior to the year in question. The rise was particularly convincing between 2013 and 2019, i.e. until COVID-19 hit, and the recovery has been fast since 2022. With the dreadful year of 2020 dropping out of 5-year average in 2026, we should see a nice upward turn there this year and quite a sharp one in 2027.

The chart below shows the volume of cargo handled at BudAir alongside a curve representing the average weight of cargo managed at the airport over the five years prior to the year in question. The annual growth was the largest at 48.8% in 2024, followed by this year's increase of 42.3% and +41.8% in 2003. The 5-year average will obviously rise further this year.

Several new destinations will be available from Budapest in 2026, including two overseas flights. American Airlines will resume direct services between Budapest and Philadelphia, and Air Canada will re-establish its route between Budapest and Toronto. Thanks to the new bilateral air transport agreement between Hungary and China, there may be an increase in the number of flights between the two countries, with Condor set to enter the Hungarian market with the launch of its Frankfurt route.

There are also developments underway at the airport. In addition to preparations for the construction of a new terminal, work began last year to increase the capacity of the current building for security screening and passenger check-in. According to a statement from Budapest Airport, the parking system will soon be renovated and the B side passenger pier will also be expanded.