Ryanair flies a record number of passengers for third straight month

The Irish airline increased passenger numbers in July by 11% compared to the same period last year. 

Ryanair flew a record 18.7 million people during the month of July marking the third straight month of record-breaking passenger numbers for the budget airline.

It represents an 11% increase on July last year with 96% of seats being filled.

July — which is also one of the busiest months on the calendar as well as one of the most profitable — also marked the first time the airline reached over 18 million passengers during a single month.

In May this year, 17 million passengers flew with Ryanair which grew to 17.4 million in June.

In a trading update from last month, Ryanair posted €663m in profit after tax for the three months to the end of June. In that time it generated €3.6bn in total revenue. 

The airline has said it expects traffic in its financial year to March 2024 to grow by 9%, to around 183.5 million passengers after it lowered forecasts from 185 million due to plane delivery delays from Boeing as well as air traffic controller strikes in France.

It said it had to cancel 800 flights in July due to strikes in France as well as ground crew strikes in Italy.

Ryanair is currently operating its largest ever summer schedule with over 3,200 flights and up to 600,000 passengers daily.