Cork Airport recorded a further increase in passenger traffic during the month of March, as a busy St. Patrick’s bank holiday weekend, the start of the Easter school holidays and fans travelling to Ireland’s World Cup qualifier in Prague all provided a welcome boost. A total of 252,326 passengers used the airport last month, marking a 1% increase compared to March 2025. In the first quarter of 2026, overall passenger numbers are up +2% compared to the first quarter of 2025, maintaining the trend of solid and measured growth since the start of the year and building further on 2025, which was Cork Airport’s busiest year ever.
UK routes featured strongly in the top-performing routes during March, with London Heathrow, London Stansted, and Manchester all featuring in the top 10, and delivering growth rates of 4%, 9% and 6% compared to the same month last year. Paris Charles de Gaulle showed the strongest growth percentage versus last year, as the Air France service has extended to a year-round operation. Monday, March 30, was the busiest day of the month which coincided with the start of the school Easter holidays.
Commenting on March passenger traffic, the Managing Director at Cork Airport, Niall MacCarthy, said, We welcome the continuing growth at Cork Airport in the first quarter of 2026, showing further growth on our highest ever passenger numbers in 2025. The first three months of the year report a combined 2% year-to-date growth in passenger numbers, which is welcome. We continue to copper fasten our position as the second largest airport in the Republic of Ireland, and our capital investment projects underway lay the foundations for growth to continue up to and beyond 5 million passengers per annum. In that regard, we were particularly pleased to announce the construction of Ireland’s largest solar carport yesterday as the latest project to be commenced in our capital programme.”
