Dubai International Airport (DXB) has registered a year of strong recovery and consistently robust growth in its customer base which propelled the annual passenger numbers to 66 million in 2022. The airport’s growth outpaced the annual forecast yet again in the final months of the year following an exceptionally strong fourth quarter.
Key facts and figures
DXB welcomed a total of 66,069,981 passengers during 2022, a year-on year-growth of 127%. Traffic volumes were propelled by strong growth in the final quarter of the year during which the airport recorded 19,729,155 passengers, up 67% compared to the fourth quarter of 2021. It was the busiest quarter since 2019. December was the busiest month of the year with 7.1 million passengers, the first time since January 2020 that DXB’s monthly traffic hit the 7 million mark.
Read more: Dubai International Airport globally first in international passengers in 2021
Top destinations
India retained its position as the top destination country for DXB by passenger volume, with a total traffic of 9.8 million passengers, followed by Saudi Arabia with 4.9 million passengers, and the United Kingdom with 4.6 million passengers. Other destination countries of note include Pakistan (3.7 million passengers) the US (3 million), and Russia (1.9 million), which along with Turkey (1.6 million) has recorded more than 100% recovery in passenger volumes compared to 2019 levels.
DXB’s top destination cities during 2022 were London with 3 million passengers, Riyadh (2 million), Mumbai (1.9 million), and Jeddah and New Delhi both with 1.7 million passengers.
DXB is currently connected to 229 destinations across 99 countries through more than 88 international carriers.
Flights
Total flight movements at DXB totaled 96,701 during the fourth quarter bringing the annual flight movements to 343,339, a year-on-year growth of 47%. The average number of passengers per flight reached 204, up 33% year-on-year.
Cargo
Cargo continued to register a contraction in volumes with 420,125 tonnes recorded in the fourth quarter, down 31.7% compared to 614,834 tonnes in Q4 of 2021. DXB handled 1,727,815 tonnes of cargo during 2022, a drop of 25.5% resulting from the moving of all major freight operators back to Dubai World Central (DWC) and the return of pax-freighter aircraft back to passenger operations during the year.
Baggage and Waiting Times
DXB’s baggage handling system processed a total of 62.2 million bags in 2022 with a success rate of 99.8% – a rate of 2.2 mishandled bags per 1,000 passengers, an impressive performance for the world’s busiest international hub. In terms of baggage delivery on arrival, 92% of all baggage was delivered within 45 minutes* to our customers. The baggage volume in 2022 represents 86.2% of the 2019 baggage volume at DXB.
Read more: Dubai Airports ups annual passenger forecast to 64.3 mn
78 million passengers in 2023
Commenting on the outlook for 2023 Paul Griffiths, CEO of Dubai Airports said With DXB forecast to welcome 78 million passengers this year, and Dubai hosting major international events including the Dubai Airshow and COP28, it will be another year of new challenges and opportunities and we are ready for them.
