Passenger traffic in France slowed down in August, with a year-on-year decrease of 1%. However, this is the second best August traffic ever recorded, behind August 2025. In the first eight months, traffic reached 123.5 million passengers, which is 0.5% less than in 2025, but still 1% above 2019, according to the latest indicator. tendanCiel of the DGAC.
The contrast is particularly stark between domestic and international markets. Domestic traffic grew by 1.4% in August, driven by metropolitan connections (+2.6%) and those between the metropolis and the Outre-mer (+2.1%). However, this recovery is not enough to erase the accumulated backlog: over eight months, domestic traffic remains stable compared to 2025 (-0.5%) and still shows a deficit of 21% compared to 2019.
The DGAC’s monthly statistics demonstrate a real turnaround starting from spring – and therefore from the new war in the Gulf. The first quarter had recorded a 2.0% increase in January, a stagnation in February (-0.3%) and a new increase of 1.4% in March.
The turnaround occurred in April, with a drop of 3.2%, followed by -1.3% in May and -1.9% in June. Traffic then rebounded by 1.4% in July with the arrival of the holidays before retreating again by 1% in August.
The international player under pressure
It is international traffic that shows the main signs of weakness. The decline is evident starting from the second quarter. The DGAC estimates, for example, that French airports have lost one million passengers over a year, or -1.9%, mainly due to the conflict in the Middle East and the Near East.
As early as March, the crisis had reduced the French offer to the Middle East and Near East by approximately 200,000 seats, or nearly 160,000 passengers. This August, traffic in this part of the world was down by nearly 9% compared to 2025!
The DGAC highlights the ripple effect on connectivity with Asia-Pacific, a significant portion of these passengers usually transit through Middle East hubs. The figures demonstrate this. Since the beginning of the year, passenger traffic on Asia-Pacific has declined by 7.9% – including a decrease of 5.1% for the month of August alone.
Passenger traffic in the United States is not much more encouraging. Despite the launch of new flights, The Trump pushback effect French leisure demand is up sharply: -3.6% in the first eight months and even -7.3% in August. However, Africa is an exception. The number of passengers increased by 1.1% during August and by 3.3% since the beginning of the year. Overall, international travel carried 105.3 million passengers, down 0.5% from 2025, but still 6.1% above 2019.
Europe is also showing increasingly visible signs of exhaustion: the number of passengers heading to the EU fell by 2.1% in August and by 0.6% since the beginning of the year.
The decline in traffic is mainly due to Parisian hubs, where international traffic is down 3.5%, while other French airports are instead seeing an increase of 1.2%. Orly has lost 7.4% passengers compared to August 2025, while Roissy CDG has lost 1.1%. Since the beginning of the year, both platforms have seen their passenger traffic stagnate.
In the first eight months of the year, Basel Mulhouse lost the largest number of passengers, by almost 11% – but due to the closure of a runway which drastically reduced traffic during a month, between April and May. Beauvais Lyon also experienced a drop in its passenger traffic of 5.6%, mainly due to the reduction in Ryanair frequencies. Lyon also lost passengers with a decrease of 1.3%.
Nevertheless, in eight months, Nice (+3.7%), Toulouse (+1.9%) and Bordeaux (+7.7%) are up, while Marseille shows a very low increase, of 0.8%.
