What Are the World’s Busiest Airports?

Airports Council International announced preliminary passenger traffic results for 2014 which show that the top four ranked positions with respect to the world's busiest airports in overall passenger traffic have not changed as compared to 2013. Based on reports from 1,095 airports worldwide, total number of passengers increased 5.1 percent while international passenger number increased 6 percent.

Atlanta (+1.9 percent) continues to be the world's busiest airport with over 96 million passengers in 2014. While Beijing (+2.9 percent) was expected to close the gap, it no longer has double digit-growth as in previous years, placing it in second position. London-Heathrow (+1.4 percent) remains in third while Tokyo-Haneda (+5.7 percent) preserves fourth position. However, Los Angeles (+6 percent) and Dubai (+6.1 percent) have moved ahead of Chicago-O'Hare (+4.6 percent), occupying the fifth and sixth rank respectively.

Although Dubai is the sixth busiest airport in the world in overall passenger traffic, it has actually become the world's busiest in terms of international passenger traffic ahead of London-Heathrow in 2014. Dubai was just shy of reaching the 70 million international passenger mark by the end of 2014.

Istanbul (+10.7 percent) remains one of the fastest growing airports among the world's top 20 airports for passenger traffic, moving from 18th to 13th rank ahead of Amsterdam Schiphol (+4.6 percent).

The world's largest air cargo hub continues to be Hong Kong (+6 percent). Memphis (+2.9 percent) is in second followed by Shanghai (+8.6 percent) and Incheon (+3.8 percent) in third and fourth rank respectively. Anchorage (+3 percent) moves up ahead of Dubai (-3.1 percent) to the 5th position.

Chicago-O'Hare (-0.2 percent) has become the world's busiest airport for aircraft movements following a drop in movements at the second ranked Atlanta (-4.7 percent) in 2014. Los Angeles (+1.7 percent) and Dallas/Fort Worth (+0.3 percent) maintain the third and fourth ranked position respectively. Beijing (+2.5 percent) moves ahead of Denver (-2.9 percent).