February was a tale of differing fortunes for Ireland’s two largest airports operated by daa – Cork Airport continued to grow strongly, while the passenger cap continued to restrict Dublin Airport.
Cork Airport welcomed a total of 203,466 passengers in February, marking an increase of 6% compared to the same month last year. In contrast, passenger numbers at Dublin Airport were down by 0.5% compared to February 2024 with just under 2.1 million passengers.
Both airports were busy in February with both inbound and outbound sports fans travelling to Six Nations rugby matches, and many people took advantage of the school mid-term break, Valentine’s Day and the St Brigid’s bank holiday weekend for short breaks.
With 1,447 flights in that period, the top 5 most popular destinations from Cork Airport were London Heathrow, London Stansted, Amsterdam, Manchester and Edinburgh.
A number of factors boosted numbers, including fans travelling to Six Nations rugby matches, and many people took advantage of the school mid-term break, Valentine’s Day and the St Brigid’s bank holiday weekend for short breaks. Kenny Jacobs, CEO of daa, the operator of Cork and Dublin airports, said efforts to improve public transport to Cork Airport are ramping up
“The increased number of passengers travelling during mid-term resulted in very healthy load factors and performance on services to London, Manchester, Liverpool, Seville and Paris, while popular sun destinations also recorded a significant boost – particularly Malaga, Alicante, Lanzarote and Tenerife.”
“Our load factors on ski services are doing extremely well and throughout February, special charter services to Verona were added to the complement of ski routes from Cork – Salzburg, Munich and Lyon.”
“The team at Cork Airport has been making great strides in improving public transport access and during the month, they announced a new integrated ticketing initiative with Iarnród Éireann and Bus Éireann which means that passengers travelling from Kerry, Limerick, Tipperary and Laois can purchase one ticket, which includes a hassle-free rail journey followed by a bus transfer from Kent Station to the airport. Cork Airport needs more public transport services, and the team are working closely with the National Transport Authority (NTA) on that front.”
Due to the passenger cap at Dublin Airport, stagnant passenger numbers were recorded in the opening months of 2025.
