September Saw Significant Year-Over-Year Increase in Airline Ticket Sales

The Airlines Reporting Corp. (ARC) has reported a massive increase in year-over-year ticket sales.

Though the month of September 2022 was flat compared to September 2021—total sales were down 1 percent—the month still brought in a total of $7.3 billion. Year-over-year, that’s a 129 percent increase.

Total passenger trips, U.S. domestic trips, and international trips decreased by two percent each, which is not a surprise considering September is usually a dormant month for air travel given that kids are back in school and college, and families tend to travel less.

“Travel demand remained relatively flat throughout September as vacation season wound down and airlines, airports and other stakeholders in the travel industry addressed the issues that impacted summer travel,” Steve Solomon, chief commercial officer at ARC, said in a statement. “As we look ahead to the final quarter of the year, we expect additional recovery in the corporate and online travel agency sectors while leisure travel holds at its current pre-pandemic levels.”

Total passenger trips settled by ARC in September 2022 increased 38 percent year over year from 15.4 million to 21.2 million. U.S. domestic trips increased 26 percent year over year to 13.9 million, with international trips increasing 65 percent to 7.3 million over the same period.

Three-quarters of the way through the month of October, demand still appears to be strong. On Sunday, October 16, the Transportation Security Administration reported screening the highest number of passengers at U.S. airports since February 2020.