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The world's top 100 airports: listed, ranked and mapped
Get the data
Data journalism and data visualisations from the Guardian
Where are the world's busiest airports?
The furore over Heathrow's immigration wait times has shone a light on the huge numbers of people flying into what is the world's third busiest airport in terms of passenger numbers.
Airports Council International compiles data for every airport in the world - and this shows exactly how busy they are. ACI has allowed us to publish its preliminary figures for that top 100 - before they've been officially released. This is how they look.
3.2bn passengers went through the world's top 100 airports in 2011, 998m of them in Europe and another 989m in North America.
The world's very biggest airports have seen big increases in passengers: Heathrow is up 5.1%, Atlanta [the world's biggest] is up 3.3% and Beijing is up 4.5%.
The biggest increases came in the new global powerhouses: New Delhi [up 17.8% to 34.7m passengers], Rio [up 17%] up Xiamen in China [up 15.9%].
The figures reflect the state of the world's economic problems too, with 13 of the top 100 airports seeing decreases in passengers, with Tokyo down 20.5%, Athens down 6.7%, followed by two more Japanese airports. London Stansted is down too, according to the data - by 2.9% to 18m passengers
But despite the recession, Europe's airport have gone up by an average of 7.4%, compared to a top 100 average change of 5.1%
Thanks to ACI, you can get the full data below. What can you do with it?
Data summary
The world's top 100 airports
Click heading to sort table. Download this data
SOURCE: AIRPORTS COUNCIL INTERNATIONAL | |||||
| 1 | Americas | ATLANTA GA, US [ATL] | 92,365,860 | 89,292,748 | 3.3 |
| 2 | Asia/Pacific | BEIJING, CN [PEK] | 77,403,668 | 73,913,402 | 4.5 |
| 3 | Europe | LONDON, GB [LHR] | 69,433,565 | 65,884,143 | 5.1 |
| 4 | Americas | CHICAGO IL, US [ORD] | 66,561,023 | 66,904,971 | -0.5 |
| 5 | Asia/Pacific | TOKYO, JP [HND] | 62,263,025 | 64,117,894 | -3.0 |
| 6 | Americas | LOS ANGELES CA, US [LAX] | 61,848,449 | 58,995,672 | 4.6 |
| 7 | Europe | PARIS, FR [CDG] | 60,970,551 | 58,166,563 | 4.6 |
| 8 | Americas | DALLAS/FORT WORTH TX, US [DFW] | 57,806,152 | 56,905,066 | 1.6 |
| 9 | Europe | FRANKFURT, DE [FRA] | 56,436,255 | 53,009,221 | 6.1 |
| 10 | Asia/Pacific | HONG KONG, HK [HKG] | 53,314,213 | 50,359,536 | 5.5 |
| 11 | Americas | DENVER CO, US [DEN] | 52,699,298 | 52,209,203 | 0.9 |
| 12 | Middle East | DUBAI, AE [DXB] | 50,977,960 | 47,180,628 | 7.4 |
| 13 | Asia/Pacific | JAKARTA, ID [CGK] | 50,446,618 | 43,981,022 | 14.7 |
| 14 | Europe | AMSTERDAM, NL [AMS] | 49,754,910 | 45,211,749 | 9.1 |
| 15 | Europe | MADRID, ES [MAD] | 49,644,302 | 49,842,726 | -0.4 |
| 16 | Asia/Pacific | BANGKOK, TH [BKK] | 47,910,744 | 42,784,967 | 10.7 |
| 17 | Americas | NEW YORK NY, US [JFK] | 47,854,283 | 46,493,667 | 2.8 |
| 18 | Asia/Pacific | SINGAPORE, SG [SIN] | 46,543,845 | 42,038,777 | 9.7 |
| 19 | Asia/Pacific | GUANGZHOU, CN [CAN] | 45,400,156 | 40,975,253 | 9.7 |
| 20 | Americas | LAS VEGAS NV, US [LAS] | 41,479,572 | 39,757,359 | 4.2 |
| 21 | Asia/Pacific | SHANGHAI, CN [PVG] | 41,450,211 | 40,387,640 | 2.6 |
| 22 | Americas | SAN FRANCISCO CA, US [SFO] | 40,907,389 | 39,254,110 | 4.0 |
| 23 | Americas | PHOENIX AZ, US [PHX] | 40,565,677 | 38,552,409 | 5.0 |
| 24 | Americas | HOUSTON TX, US [IAH] | 40,170,844 | 40,475,669 | -0.8 |
| 25 | Americas | CHARLOTTE NC, US [CLT] | 39,043,708 | 38,143,078 | 2.3 |
| 26 | Americas | MIAMI FL, US [MIA] | 38,314,389 | 35,698,025 | 6.8 |
| 27 | Europe | MUNICH, DE [MUC] | 37,763,701 | 34,721,605 | 8.1 |
| 28 | Asia/Pacific | KUALA LUMPUR, MY [KUL] | 37,670,586 | 34,087,636 | 9.5 |
| 29 | Europe | ROME, IT [FCO] | 37,651,222 | 36,227,778 | 3.8 |
| 30 | Europe | ISTANBUL, TR [IST] | 37,398,221 | 32,165,817 | 14.0 |
| 31 | Asia/Pacific | SYDNEY, AU [SYD] | 36,022,614 | 35,992,172 | 0.1 |
| 32 | Americas | ORLANDO FL, US [MCO] | 35,356,991 | 34,877,507 | 1.4 |
| 33 | Asia/Pacific | INCHEON, KR [ICN] | 35,191,825 | 33,605,579 | 4.5 |
| 34 | Asia/Pacific | NEW DELHI, IN [DEL] | 34,729,467 | 28,531,607 | 17.8 |
| 35 | Europe | BARCELONA, ES [BCN] | 34,387,597 | 29,197,135 | 15.1 |
| 36 | Europe | LONDON, GB [LGW] | 33,668,048 | 31,378,644 | 6.8 |
| 37 | Americas | NEWARK NJ, US [EWR] | 33,577,154 | 33,133,852 | 1.3 |
| 38 | Americas | TORONTO ON, CA [YYZ] | 33,434,199 | 31,937,895 | 4.5 |
| 39 | Asia/Pacific | SHANGHAI, CN [SHA] | 33,112,442 | 31,298,812 | 5.5 |
| 40 | Americas | MINNEAPOLIS MN, US [MSP] | 33,074,443 | 32,749,649 | 1.0 |
| 41 | Americas | SEATTLE WA, US [SEA] | 32,820,060 | 31,553,166 | 3.9 |
| 42 | Americas | DETROIT MI, US [DTW] | 32,419,181 | 32,377,064 | 0.1 |
| 43 | Americas | PHILADELPHIA PA, US [PHL] | 30,839,130 | 30,775,271 | 0.2 |
| 44 | Asia/Pacific | MUMBAI, IN [BOM] | 30,439,122 | 28,137,797 | 7.6 |
| 45 | Americas | SÃO PAULO, BR [GRU] | 30,371,131 | 27,432,346 | 9.7 |
| 46 | Asia/Pacific | MANILA, PH [MNL] | 29,551,394 | 27,148,724 | 8.1 |
| 47 | Asia/Pacific | CHENGDU, CN [CTU] | 29,073,990 | 25,805,815 | 11.2 |
| 48 | Americas | BOSTON MA, US [BOS] | 28,866,313 | 27,429,152 | 5.0 |
| 49 | Asia/Pacific | SHENZHEN, CN [SZX] | 28,245,745 | 26,713,610 | 5.4 |
| 50 | Asia/Pacific | MELBOURNE, AU [MEL] | 28,060,111 | 27,731,252 | 1.2 |
| 51 | Asia/Pacific | TOKYO, JP [NRT] | 28,055,772 | 33,815,906 | -20.5 |
| 52 | Europe | PARIS, FR [ORY] | 27,139,076 | 25,203,787 | 7.1 |
| 53 | Americas | MEXICO CITY, MX [MEX] | 26,368,861 | 24,130,535 | 8.5 |
| 54 | Europe | MOSCOW, RU [DME] | 25,701,610 | 22,253,529 | 13.4 |
| 55 | Europe | ANTALYA, TR [AYT] | 25,183,142 | 21,857,524 | 13.2 |
| 56 | Asia/Pacific | TAIPEI, TW [TPE] | 24,947,551 | 25,114,413 | -0.7 |
| 57 | Europe | ZURICH, CH [ZRH] | 24,283,941 | 22,826,942 | 6.0 |
| 58 | Americas | NEW YORK NY, US [LGA] | 24,028,400 | 23,980,687 | 0.2 |
| 59 | Americas | FORT LAUDERDALE, FL, US [FLL] | 23,348,804 | 22,406,810 | 4.0 |
| 60 | Americas | WASHINGTON, DC, US [IAD] | 23,056,291 | 23,447,177 | -1.7 |
| 61 | Europe | PALMA DE MALLORCA, ES [PMI] | 22,723,837 | 21,110,092 | 7.1 |
| 62 | Europe | COPENHAGEN, DK [CPH] | 22,673,477 | 21,452,464 | 5.4 |
| 63 | Europe | MOSCOW, RU [SVO] | 22,555,309 | 19,329,185 | 14.3 |
| 64 | Americas | BALTIMORE MD, US [BWI] | 22,395,638 | 21,951,650 | 2.0 |
| 65 | Asia/Pacific | KUNMING, CN [KMG] | 22,272,776 | 20,194,754 | 9.3 |
| 66 | Europe | VIENNA, AT [VIE] | 21,106,330 | 19,691,206 | 6.7 |
| 67 | Europe | OSLO, NO [OSL] | 21,092,873 | 19,091,113 | 9.5 |
| 68 | Middle East | JEDDAH, SA [JED] | 20,929,686 | 17,913,975 | 14.4 |
| 69 | Asia/Pacific | BRISBANE, AU [BNE] | 20,589,207 | 20,020,966 | 2.8 |
| 70 | Americas | SALT LAKE CITY UT, US [SLC] | 20,440,913 | 20,987,646 | -2.7 |
| 71 | Europe | DÜSSELDORF, DE [DUS] | 20,339,466 | 18,988,489 | 6.6 |
| 72 | Europe | BOGOTA, CO [BOG] | 20,327,901 | 18,827,118 | 7.4 |
| 73 | Europe | MILAN, IT [MXP] | 19,291,427 | 18,947,808 | 1.8 |
| 74 | Africa | JOHANNESBURG, ZA [JNB] | 19,114,384 | 18,565,250 | 2.9 |
| 75 | Europe | STOCKHOLM, SE [ARN] | 19,088,363 | 16,988,614 | 11.0 |
| 76 | Europe | MANCHESTER, GB [MAN] | 18,991,503 | 17,873,023 | 5.9 |
| 77 | Americas | CHICAGO IL, US [MDW] | 18,882,549 | 17,647,771 | 6.5 |
| 78 | Americas | WASHINGTON DC, US [DCA] | 18,811,335 | 18,105,802 | 3.8 |
| 79 | Europe | BRUSSELS, BE [BRU] | 18,756,885 | 17,149,416 | 8.6 |
| 80 | Europe | DUBLIN, IE [DUB] | 18,735,944 | 18,431,678 | 1.6 |
| 81 | Asia/Pacific | SEOUL, KR [GMP] | 18,513,982 | 17,575,244 | 5.1 |
| 82 | Middle East | DOHA, QA [DOH] | 18,202,649 | 15,863,292 | 12.9 |
| 83 | Europe | LONDON, GB [STN] | 18,046,777 | 18,574,204 | -2.9 |
| 84 | Asia/Pacific | HANGZHOU, CN [HGH] | 17,512,034 | 17,068,585 | 2.5 |
| 85 | Asia/Pacific | JEJU, KR [CJU] | 17,202,278 | 15,724,770 | 8.6 |
| 86 | Americas | VANCOUVER BC, CA [YVR] | 17,193,080 | 16,926,870 | 1.5 |
| 87 | Europe | BERLIN, DE [TXL] | 16,919,820 | 15,025,600 | 11.2 |
| 88 | Americas | SAN DIEGO CA, US [SAN] | 16,836,027 | 16,901,322 | -0.4 |
| 89 | Americas | TAMPA FL, US [TPA] | 16,732,051 | 16,645,765 | 0.5 |
| 90 | Americas | SÃO PAULO, BR [CGH] | 16,687,731 | 15,441,789 | 7.5 |
| 91 | Americas | BRASILIA, BR [BSB] | 15,801,122 | 14,824,113 | 6.2 |
| 92 | Asia/Pacific | SAPPORO, JP [CTS] | 15,773,073 | 16,745,235 | -6.2 |
| 93 | Asia/Pacific | XIAMEN, CN [XMN] | 15,753,183 | 13,248,367 | 15.9 |
| 94 | Middle East | RIYADH, SA [RUH] | 15,432,950 | 14,136,837 | 8.4 |
| 95 | Asia/Pacific | FUKUOKA, JP [FUK] | 15,431,078 | 16,404,617 | -6.3 |
| 96 | Americas | RIO DE JANEIRO, BR [GIG] | 15,184,350 | 12,605,637 | 17.0 |
| 97 | Europe | HELSINKI, FI [HEL] | 14,851,675 | 12,866,036 | 13.4 |
| 98 | Europe | LISBON, PT [LIS] | 14,791,260 | 14,058,751 | 5.0 |
| 99 | Europe | ATHENS, GR [ATH] | 14,428,032 | 15,390,156 | -6.7 |
| 100 | Asia/Pacific | AUCKLAND, NZ [AKL] | 14,012,329 | 13,705,116 | 2.2 |
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