Atlanta Airport Reclaims Title As 'World's Busiest'

ATLANTA, GA — Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport has reclaimed its title as the world's busiest airport for 2021, according to a new report.

Airports Council International World published Monday the top 10 busiest airports worldwide, and the Atlanta airport took the No. 1 spot.

After knocking Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport from the No. 1 spot in 2020, Guangzhou Bai Yun International Airport in China slid to the eighth position in 2021.

In 2021, Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport saw 75.7 million passengers — that is up 76.4 percent from 2020, according to the new report.

Despite the big increase, the report also found that increase is still 31. 5 percent below pre-pandemic 2019 figures.

The Atlanta airport's passenger traffic is followed by Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport (No. 2 - 62.5 million passengers) and Denver International Airport (No. 3 - 58.8 million passengers).

Eight of the top 10 airports for passenger traffic are in the United States with the two remaining in China.

All top 10 airports have a significant share of domestic traffic, the traffic segment that has been leading global recovery.

“The ACI World passenger traffic rankings tell the story of an encouraging trend of recovery, with most of the recurrent busiest airports pre-COVID-19 back at the top,” ACI World Director General Luis Felipe de Oliveira said in a news release. “Although we are cautious that recovery could face multiple headwinds, the momentum created by reopening plans by countries could lead to an uptick in travel in the second half of 2022.

“As such, ACI World continues to advocate to governments to follow the data and ease travel restrictions to safely restore the movement of people, goods, and services. This will provide travellers with more travel options and boost the overall recovery through aviation’s unique role in boosting trade, tourism, investment and creating jobs.”

The world airport rankings are based on the preliminary compilation of 2021 global data from airports around the world, according to ACI World.

To see the complete report, visit the ACI website.