Countries Whose Airlines Carried the Most Passengers

In the year 2023, which countries were the home base of airlines that carried the most passengers in total?

Growth = % growth since 2000

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Last updated: February 4, 2026

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First submitted	July 1, 2013
Times taken	71,504
Average score	85.0%
Rating	4.94

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#	Growth	Country
942 m	42%	United States
619 m	900%	China
193 m	1,277%	Ireland
180 m	943%	India
126 m	933%	Turkey
120 m	10%	Japan
119 m	69%	United Kingdom
98.9 m	459%	Russia
97.0 m	879%	Indonesia
95.4 m	205%	Brazil
94.1 m	137%	Spain
91.1 m	1,221%	United Arab Emirates
88.6 m	112%	Canada
80.2 m	38%	Germany
78.8 m	277%	Mexico
76.3 m	122%	South Korea
69.0 m	112%	Australia
64.6 m	23%	France
55.6 m	2,431%	Hungary
55.1 m	1,815%	Vietnam

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69 Comments

+21

Level ∞

Sep 11, 2017

The growth in air travel and tourism worldwide has been remarkable. I think it will cause more disruptions moving forward as previously cool places are inundated with tourists. Many countries have seen tourism grow at an annual rate of 10% or more for over two decades. Of course, I'm a tourist too so I can't complain - I just want other people to stay home. :)

Level 46

Sep 11, 2017

What's remarkable is that developed countries seem to have massive growth as well, apart from the US and Japan. I'm guessing the US is partly due to 9/11 and Japan due to its population decrease

Level ∞

Sep 12, 2017

My guess is that deregulation happened earlier in the US. When it happened in the UK and Ireland, it allowed for the massive growth of budget airlines post 2000.

Level 93

Sep 12, 2017

Yeah, there must be an out-of-the-ordinary explanation for Ireland. There hasn't been a massive population increase or anything else to explain 800% growth.

Level 66

Mar 15, 2026

I can explain the growth for Ireland with one word, er, name: Ryanair.

+28

Level 46

Sep 13, 2017

This data is done by airlines based in each country. Ireland can be explained by Ryanair. And thinking about it easyJet can probably partly explain the UK's growth.

Level 37

Dec 16, 2017

@tschutzer like relessness said, ryanair is nearly as big as delta and it was founded in Ireland, it stretches all around the globe, youd be lucky to find a european airport without a ryanair flight

Level 50

Mar 9, 2026

Well all around the globe is a stretch, it's really only in Europe and Turkey. Wizz Air on the other hand reaches some places in India and the Middle East, but still 95% European

Level 36

May 5, 2020

We don't need to explain Ireland's growth if it's in Europe. That's the explanation right there

+13

Level 79

Sep 28, 2019

We just need fewer people, period. Thanos 2020.

+27

Level 94

Aug 22, 2020

My god this comment did NOT age well! Lol

Level 94

Sep 2, 2020

Really? In the midst of the current pandemic, I still found it funny.

Level 79

Jan 27, 2022

If inevitable evil won't kill off half the population then I guess we'll have to settle for callous stupidity. Sure.

+10

Level 60

Sep 12, 2017

Who says global warming is a conspiracy? That's just caused by human factors, like travelling by air so many times.

Level 49

Jun 27, 2018

Palm oil production also causes global warming on a massive scale. Don't buy any product that contains it!

Level 79

Sep 13, 2017

Wow, never would have guessed Ireland would be so high. That's amazing for such a small country.

+25

Level 75

Sep 13, 2017

Ryan Air.

+13

Level 86

Sep 25, 2017

Yeah Ryanair. Most of Europe is one market but still divided into countries. Ryanair is a pan-European airline with hubs all over, but based in Ireland, so all the passengers are counted there, regardless of their passports and route.

I don't know where the major US airlines are headquartered, but you would probably get similarly surprising results if you used the same method for counting passengers "per state".

Level 66

Sep 2, 2019

Yes I would imagine that Texas (American), Illinois (United) and Georgia (Delta) would be by far the highest. You’re right, though, the growth of easyJet and Ryanair has had an immense impact on passenger figures for the UK and Ireland. I would imagine Norwegian Airlines have had a big impact on Norway’s figures also.

Level 79

Feb 4, 2026

Taking this quiz almost a decade later, Ireland was one of the first countries that I tried because of Ryan Air.

Level 57

Dec 16, 2017

Please please please restrict the percentile % to those who have completed the quiz 3 times or less , the stats are clearly skewed in the Geography category by those who are taking the test and scoring 100 percent tens and twenty and thirty times , THERE is NO possibility a first time score of 17 of Twenty would merit a 20 percentile unless the scenario i just described is rampant

+25

Level 79

Dec 16, 2017

I'm almost positive that the first time is the only one that goes towards the percentage. A lot of people on this site just know geography very well.

+12

Level 55

Dec 16, 2017

Only the first attempt of a quiz is counted in the percentages. On Jetpunk, there's a huge amount of geography nerds. Or maybe people simply type a lot of somewhat likely countries really fast.

Level 80

Jan 10, 2018

Why would someone sit and take this quiz 10, 20, 30 times? And why do you care?

Level 76

Feb 18, 2020

Only the first time counts. That goes for all the quizzes on this site. For this one you dont need to know much about geography. All the answers are very well known countries (perhaps UAE less so but every 8 year old will know the others) and they are rather logical guesses. Guess the big ones and the ones with a good economy and voila.

Level 48

Sep 17, 2020

The UAE is in many ways quite obvious given Emirates and Etihad. The two less intuitive ones are the two other smallest (by population) countries on the list - Ireland and Malaysia. As others have said, these are easily explained by the massive LCCs headquartered in each - Ryanair and Air Asia

Level 37

Dec 16, 2017

How is Ireland able to make this list?

Level 55

Dec 16, 2017

That surprised me too. I missed two countries and Ireland was one of them. Shocked to see them ahead of Germany and Japan. Everyone in the country must fly several times to and from the UK each year.

+13

Level 72

Dec 16, 2017

I think it's because it's not the flights to and from the country - it's the flights made by the airlines based in the country. Ireland has basically one big airline - Ryanair - which makes loads of flights in and between other countries.

Level 86

Dec 17, 2017

Indeed, a domestic Ryanair flight in Italy counts to Ireland numbers above.

Level 59

Dec 16, 2017

Shocked too see the growth rate of UAE !

Level 35

Dec 16, 2017

UAE has Dubai, and Dubai International Airport is now the world's number one in International Passenger travel category.

Level 46

Dec 16, 2017

Emirates and Etihad probably the main two reasons for the growth

Level 78

Dec 16, 2017

The source unforntunately lacks the data for Norway, Sweden and Denmark. SAS with 29.4 M and Norwegian with 29.3 M passengers in 2016 are thrown in the mix. However their legal domiciles may not be entirely clear. Norway could get both allocations and make the list. :)

Level 70

Dec 16, 2017

This is a list of Airlines not of travel in/out of the country where the Airline is registered. e.g. here in Australia if I fly Lufthansa to Hong Kong it is Germany that gets registered in this quiz.

Level 46

Dec 17, 2017

Totally forgot about Ryanair

Level 66

Jan 18, 2019

Amazing how Ireland, a country with 5 million, is up there with the USA, China and the UK, just because of one airline.

Level 34

Apr 29, 2019

Got all but one. Figured islands would have a lot of airline passengers.

Level 60

Oct 11, 2019

Shocked to see malaysia on the list. I wouldn’t fly with them if my life depended on it

Level 48

Sep 17, 2020

It's Air Asia that's the key driver behind the Malaysia figure, not Malaysia Airlines. Though the latter in my experience is very safety conscious: the Ukraine incident was a wrong place / wrong time issue that isn't their fault; the missing mystery plane may have been their fault but we shall never know!

Level 82

Feb 18, 2021

There's nothing wrong with Malaysian airlines. Being a Malaysian I've flown with them dozens and dozens of times.

Level 50

Dec 29, 2024

Malaysia Airlines is fine. The Ukraine incident was due to a Russian missile (and sadly the Russians haven't mended their trigger-happy tendencies as the recent Caspian crash has shown). The MH370 disappearance is however a massive mystery!

Level 65

Apr 2, 2020

The high figure for Malaysia is because of Air Asia.

Level 82

Feb 18, 2021

I'm from the least guessed country :/

Level 40

Jul 28, 2021

Hello Malaysian!

Level 48

Mar 14, 2021

I got it all right! I almost forgot about South Korea. No one forgot USA!

Level 73

Oct 1, 2021

Hmm, I wonder what is a country with 126 million passengers, and has had a 799% growth since 2000?

I know!

North Korea-

Level 69

Apr 11, 2023

It does not make any sense to have Ireland fourth on this list. In fact, the EU operates as a single country. According to the "freedoms of the air" established by the International Air Services Transit Agreement (IASTA), European airlines are generally allowed to operate freely within the European Union (EU) and the European Economic Area (EEA) without any restrictions on routes, frequencies, or fares. I would concentrate all EU countries in one, and make this quiz as "single skies" rather than "countries". Something similar may happen soon when SAATM will be operative in Africa.

Level 55

Jul 28, 2023

tf is Ireland doing?? They literally got 5 million people.

Level 61

Sep 18, 2023

Ryanair.

Level 88

Feb 4, 2026

How would they figuratively have 5 million people? The word literally is unnecessary here.

Level 44

Jul 27, 2025

so funnnnnnn!

Level 56

Oct 30, 2025

Missed Thailand. 19/20 great quiz.

Level 82

Feb 4, 2026

I presume that Hungary has made it onto this list because of Whizz Air. My advice to readers is to avoid them as you would a rabid dog. They are a bunch of crooks.

Level 82

Feb 4, 2026

Original comment, made me smile! I mean, they are a low-budget-airline after all, but I don't see what would set them apart from Ryanair or EasyJet in a negative way.

Level 69

Feb 4, 2026

Wow, it's really a discovery for me that Wizz Air is a Hungarian company. That's cool!

Level 75

Feb 4, 2026

smaller bag allowance compared to the other two

Level 48

Feb 7, 2026

no, ryanair has the same

Level 75

Feb 4, 2026

I agree. Easyjet and Rynair are better.

Level 91

Feb 4, 2026

Holy Ryanair.

Level 93

Feb 4, 2026

I only missed Ireland (had no idea!) and Russia (thought I'd already guessed it) the first time around.

Level 66

Mar 9, 2026

Ryanair is Irish

Level 87

Feb 5, 2026

wizzair my goat

Level 65

Feb 6, 2026

Are the figures from adding up all the airlines in the country or just the biggest airline in the country?

Also, no AirAsia?

Level 74

Feb 11, 2026

No Singapore?

Level 43

Mar 9, 2026

KLM, Netherlands?

Level 55

Mar 9, 2026

I am also amazed Netherlands is not there. I guess that now that KLM it is part of Airfrance, their passangers are added to France.

Level 56

Mar 9, 2026

How is there no Qatar with Qatar airlines? It is an enormous hub between Europe and Asia

Level 73

Mar 10, 2026

Oh crap - was thinking of big populations and huge economies. Totally forgot how a single player like Ryanair can upend a chart like this.