After a slow start, Asia Pacific is leading the recovery in global aviation industry with highest capacity additions as well as being home to the busiest domestic and international routes says the latest weekly data by OAG.

The global aviation capacity has seen an increase of 409,000 seats or 0.4 pc week on week, with total seats deployed across the globe reaching 98.3 million, says aviation data aggregator and analyst firm OAG.

OAG says that the global airline capacity now is 7.3 pc below the corresponding week in 2019 and that the capacity worldwide for the coming three months will see an increase next week and reach 100.9 million seats and further rising steadily week over week to 107 million by mid-May.

The domestic aviation capacity is now just a shade behind the 2019 levels in the corresponding week and is set to overtake that level in the week ahead, says OAG. It says that global domestic airline capacity is close to last week’s level with just an increase of 137,000 seats, or 0.2 pc this week.  Domestic capacity is now just 0.7 pc behind the same week in 2019. It goes on to say that if next week’s anticipated capacity increase to 64.9 m seats comes through, domestic seats will finally reach above 2019 levels, a full 3 years after the pandemic. A major milestone for the aviation industry.

The capacity addition is continuing in the international sector as well as this week has seen a growth of 0.8 pc with 237,000 more seats than last week. OAG says that the total international airline capacity is now 17.4 pc behind the same week in 2019, and is expected to reach close to 90 pc of 2019 levels by mid-May, based on the current forward look at international scheduled capacity.

This week sees 409,000 additional seats added, with two-thirds of these on International routes across various regions. Western Europe has 80,000 extra seats, and a number of regions have an additional 25-30,000 seats this week, including North Africa, South East Asia, North East Asia, Eastern Europe, the Middle East and North America, says OAG. There are more fluctuations domestically where in North East Asia carriers have reduced capacity by 167,000 whilst in Lower South America, there is an increase of 249,000 seats.

OAG says that in February 2023, the busiest international flight routes for seat capacity are mostly in Pacific Asia and the Middle East, with the Kuala Lumpur-Singapore Changi route out in front with 350,640 seats, followed by Cairo-Jeddah on 320,237 seats. It adds that in the domestic markets, the domination is again by Asia.

In February, Jeju (CJU)-Seoul (GMP) continues to be the busiest domestic route with 1.1 million seats, however it has seen a capacity decrease of 7 pc this month compared to last month, says OAG, adding that Hanoi (HAN)-Ho Chi Minh City (SGN) has moved back up into 2nd place with 930,391 seats and a capacity decrease of 5 pc.

Sapporo New Chitose (CTS)–Tokyo Haneda (HND) has moved down 1 place into 3rd with 900,606 seats, while Jakarta (CGK)–Denpasar (DPS) has had the biggest capacity decrease this month compared to last month with a fall of 19 pc and has moved from 6th place to 9th place.