“It is apparent from our statistics that there is continued and growing consumer demand for air travel. While airlines worldwide are responding to this demand by increasing their capacity, they are also committed to making significant investment in new, more efficient aircraft.”
John Weber, managing director, Aviation Services, OAG

Growing consumer demand for air travel continues, with almost 20 million more seats available in July than the equivalent month a year ago. According to the latest statistics from OAG, a record 300 million seats were available – up 7% – with a 5% increase in the number of timetabled flights to just over 2.5 million.

Within this global figure, the low-cost sector shows a 23% increase of over 76,000 more flights year-on-year and a 27% rise in the number of seats available, representing an extra 12.9 million low-cost seats compared to July 2006. The budget sector accounted for 16% of all flights (up from 13% a year ago) and 20% of all seats (a rise of 4%).

Aircraft fleet data from OAG's sister company, BACK Aviation Solutions, reveals there are 38,234 planes operating worldwide compared to 36,803 the same time last year, an increase of almost 4%. North America accounts for nearly one third with 13,800 aircraft, followed by Europe with 10,390. The regions showing the largest year-on-year increases are Asia Pacific (6.6%) and Africa (6.2%).

John Weber, managing director, Aviation Services, at OAG, comments: “It is apparent from our statistics that there is continued and growing consumer demand for air travel. While airlines worldwide are responding to this demand by increasing their capacity, they are also committed to making significant investment in new, more efficient aircraft.”