During the 2024 summer travel season, the entire civil aviation industry cumulatively transported over 140 million passengers, with an average of 2.28 million passengers per day, marking a 12% increase from the 2023 summer travel season and an 18% increase from 2019.

This is a summary provided by Air Travel Intelligence for the two-month summer travel period. Earlier, the Civil Aviation Administration also released the civil aviation summer travel situation up to August 20th, stating that since entering August, the daily passenger transport volume of civil aviation has continued to exceed 2.3 million passengers, reaching a historical high of 2.4514 million on August 10th.

Looking at the passenger volume data, this year's summer travel market has continued the prosperity of last year, but not all companies have benefited from it. Some large and medium-sized airlines have revealed to reporters that the ticket prices during this year's summer travel season are far lower than last year, meaning that airlines have not made as much profit as they did during the 2023 summer travel season.

Behind the record high is the increase in volume and decrease in price

The civil aviation passenger volume during the summer travel season mainly comes from tourists. The impressive scenes of crowded places during the summer vacation last year continue to be memorable. This summer, domestic and cross-border tourism have maintained a high-spirited operation on a high base.

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The latest statistics released by Flight Butler today show that the total civil aviation passenger transport volume during the entire summer travel season is expected to reach 142 million passengers, a 12.4% increase from 2023 and a 17.9% increase from the pre-pandemic year of 2019. Among them, domestic passenger traffic increased by 8.3% compared to 2023 and by 21.7% compared to 2019. International passenger traffic increased by 80.0% compared to 2023 and decreased by 7.4% compared to 2019.

In contrast, the increase in domestic airlines' capacity deployment during the summer travel season is smaller than the increase in passenger volume. It is estimated that the number of civil aviation flights during the summer travel season will be 1.022 million, a 7.0% increase from 2023 and a 9.0% increase from 2019. Among them, domestic flight volume increased by 2.3% compared to 2023 and by 16.0% compared to 2019, while international flight volume increased by 64.9% compared to 2023 and decreased by 21.8% compared to 2019.

Despite the supply of capacity appearing to be less than demand, ticket prices during this year's summer travel season are significantly lower than the same period last year.

Data from Air Travel Intelligence shows that the average price of domestic flight tickets (excluding taxes) during the summer travel season has decreased by about 10.7% compared to the same period last year, and shows a trend of "low to high and then low again."

On the Flight Butler platform, the average price of domestic tickets (economy class) for the 2024 summer travel season is 904 yuan (including fuel surcharge), which is also a 13.8% decrease compared to 2023.OTA platforms are also following a similar trend. "Without the revenge travel of last year, coupled with the recovery of the supply chain, this year's summer travel products such as air tickets, hotels, and study tours have shown a downward trend in prices. The average domestic air ticket price has dropped by about 10%, and the average price of international air tickets has decreased by double digits compared to last year. At the same time, the average hotel price has decreased by less than 10% year-on-year," Ctrip pointed out in its latest report.

"As soon as the air ticket prices go up, the load factor drops," a marketing department member of an airline company told the reporter, noting that compared to last year's summer travel, the public is more sensitive to prices. They can choose to take the train instead of flying, and the pricing between airlines is also very competitive.

This trend of "prosperous passenger flow but not prosperous revenue" was actually reflected in the first half of the year. The reporter found that the passenger-kilometer revenue of several listed airlines in the first half of the year was lower than the same period last year.

For example, Air China's passenger-kilometer revenue in the first half of this year was 0.5369 yuan, compared to 0.6107 yuan in the same period last year, a decrease of 12.5%; Hainan Airlines' passenger-kilometer revenue was 0.5096 yuan, compared to 0.5241 yuan in the same period last year, a decrease of 2.77%; Spring Airlines' passenger-kilometer revenue was 0.393 yuan, compared to 0.403 yuan in the same period last year, a decrease of 2.48%. This indicates that ticket prices have decreased across the board, including low-cost airlines, with full-service airlines experiencing a more significant drop.

Where do passengers fly to?

For many airlines, the money earned during this summer travel season is far less than last year. However, for airports whose profits mainly rely on flight operations and passenger volume, they are still the beneficiaries of this year's summer travel season.

According to the statistics from Flight Travel, during this year's summer travel season, the route network of popular tourist cities is strong. First-tier cities such as Shanghai, Shenzhen, and Guangzhou have the top three growth rates of incoming and outgoing flights, with year-on-year increases of 10.77%, 9.64%, and 9.03% respectively. Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, and Chongqing remain popular tourist cities.

After entering the middle and late July, various parts of the country have ushered in high temperatures one after another, and regions with lower temperatures such as the Northeast, Southwest, and Northwest have also become popular destinations for summer travelers. Ctrip data shows that the summer tourism orders for places like Kashgar, Yili, and Heihe have increased by 27%, 25%, and 23% year-on-year respectively. The passenger volume in popular tourist cities such as Altay in Xinjiang and Liupanshui in Guizhou has increased by 136.3% and 112.3% year-on-year, with flight capacity increasing by 84.1% and 101.3% year-on-year respectively.

The airports in the aforementioned cities are also greater beneficiaries. Data from Flight Butler shows that compared to 2023, during the summer travel season, the top 10 domestic routes with the most increased flights are mostly related to tourist cities. Among them, Harbin-Shenzhen has the most additional flights, with an average of about 12.3 additional flights per day; in the top 10 routes with the most reduced flights, Chongqing-Beijing has the most reduced flights, with the average number of round trips decreasing from 70 to 61 flights per day. In addition, among the top 10 routes with the most reduced flights, there are 3 related to Kunming and 2 related to Xi'an.

Compared to the summer travel routes in 2023, in the summer travel routes of 2024, among the newly opened domestic routes, Xinjiang accounts for 4 out of the top 10 routes with the most flights, and most of the top 10 routes are trunk and feeder lines, except for Haikou-Qingdao and Shanghai-Hefei; the top 10 routes with the most suspended flights are mostly short-haul related feeder routes.However, not all airports have benefited from this. This year, during the summer travel season, 38 airports with a passenger throughput of over ten million saw a year-on-year increase. Compared to the summer travel season of 2023, Shanghai Pudong Airport (26.8%), Qingdao Jiaodong Airport (19.3%), Beijing Capital Airport (18.3%), and Chengdu Tianfu Airport (18.1%) saw the largest increases in passenger volume. In contrast, Nanning Wuxu, Wenzhou Longwan, and Sanya Phoenix Airports experienced year-on-year decreases of 2.3%, 2.2%, and 1.7%, respectively.

Additionally, the flight volumes at airports in Tibet, Gansu, Inner Mongolia, and Xinjiang have increased by 33.7%, 24.8%, 22.0%, and 20.2% compared to 2019, and by 8.8%, 10.4%, 5.1%, and 13.3% compared to 2023, respectively. Popular cities in Xinjiang such as Kashgar, Kuche, Turpan, Altay, and Hami have seen flight volume increases of over 40% compared to 2023. Dali in Yunnan has seen a year-on-year increase of 63.7%, while Ordos in Inner Mongolia and Guiyang in Guizhou have both seen increases of over 10% compared to 2023. Meanwhile, Guangxi has seen a decrease in flight volume compared to both 2019 and 2023.

The diversion of international traffic has also played a role. Flight volumes in Sanya, Hainan, and Nanning, Guangxi have decreased compared to 2023, which is related to the diversion of passengers to Southeast Asia and other regions.

This year's summer travel season saw the majority of international departures from civil aviation concentrated in Southeast Asia and East Asia, accounting for 76.3% of total flights. Southeast Asia remains the region with the densest flight routes, but it still has nearly 200 fewer routes compared to 2019. The number of routes to North America is less than half of what it was in 2019, while the number of routes to West Asia, Central Asia, and Africa has surpassed the pre-pandemic levels.

The visa-free policies of Southeast Asian countries such as Singapore, Malaysia, and Thailand have played a significant role. Data from the Tongcheng Travel platform shows that the summer flight bookings from major domestic cities to Singapore have increased by over 110% year-on-year, and hotel bookings have increased by nearly 300% year-on-year. Other popular outbound travel destinations include Bangkok, Tokyo, Kuala Lumpur, Seoul, and Osaka.

"In the first half of the year, the overall recovery of international passenger flights in civil aviation reached 70.5% of the 2019 level, showing a slow and linear trend. The recovery rate increased from 65.6% in January to 73.3% in June, with an average monthly increase of 1.5 percentage points. With the overlap of various passenger flows such as tourism, family visits, and student travel during the summer travel season, demand further increased, and flights recovered to 78.2%," according to a report by Flight Butler. It is expected that the recovery trend will continue in September and the fourth quarter, with an overall estimate that flights in the second half of the year will recover to 82.7% of the 2019 level. It is projected that in 2024, the total number of international flights will reach 601,000, recovering to 77% of the 2019 level.

As for the upcoming Mid-Autumn Festival holiday, there is potential for further reductions in airfare prices. On the Flight Butler platform, the average price of international/Hong Kong, Macao, and Taiwan tickets during this year's Mid-Autumn Festival holiday has decreased by 11.67% compared to 2019, and the average price of domestic tickets has decreased by 3% compared to 2019. Ctrip data also shows that as of August 26, travel and hotel costs from September to the Mid-Autumn Festival can save an average of 20-30% compared to the summer period.

"The average payment price for Mid-Autumn Festival tickets has dropped by a quarter compared to the summer, reflecting the current state of the domestic tourism market with uneven peak and off-peak seasons. In terms of price and the number of trips, the three-day holidays of Mid-Autumn Festival, Dragon Boat Festival, and Qingming Festival have not fully stimulated the tourism market, mainly due to the short holidays and the need to make up for workdays," Xiao Peng, a researcher at Qunar Big Data Research Institute, analyzed. From this weekend until the National Day holiday, there will be a noticeable decrease in passenger volume. The proportion of family travel during the Mid-Autumn Festival will significantly decrease, while the proportion of the 18-23-year-old college student group will increase. According to reservation data, nearly 40% of college student travelers choose to travel in groups, and 30% of college student travelers plan to visit more than two destinations in three days.