Global airline capacity is recovering, but Asia-Pacific is lagging

IBA’s monthly Aviation Industry Barometer for May 2022 (released on 1st July) shows a continuing recovery in airline capacity across most of the globe, but with negative year-on-year growth in Asia-Pacific. Intelligence from IBA’s Insight IQ platform indicates that the recovery in monthly global passenger flights grew by 4% in May 2022, with flight capacity at 78% relative to pre-pandemic levels.

The Aviation Industry Barometer for May 2022 also reveals that:

Latin America performed strongly in May 2022, with flight capacity exceeding pre-pandemic levels by 2%

Europe and the Middle East showed healthy gains in recovery, increasing 6% month-on-month to 83% of pre-pandemic levels
Asia-Pacific flight capacity continues to show negative year-on-year growth in the face of tight restrictions and lockdowns across some jurisdictions, although some improvement has been seen compared to April 2022
Global international flights grew by 12% month-on-month
Overall, there were approximately 2.31 million commercial passenger flights in May 2022, compared to 2.08 in April 2022 and 1.72 in May 2021
There were 88 commercial aircraft deliveries in May 2022, representing a month-on-month variance of +11% compared to April 2022, and a year-on-year increase of 24% compared to May 2021
Deliveries in the narrowbody category were led by the Airbus A320neo family, while the A350, A330 and Boeing 777 families shared three deliveries each in the widebody segment
Freighter deliveries remained exclusive to Boeing, with four aircraft delivered in May – three 777F and one 747-8F aircraft to a mixture of operators.
IBA is an aviation market intelligence and consultancy company. The fourth edition of IBA’s Aviation Industry Barometer can be downloaded here.