Flying Guinness sales at Dublin Airport top €8m, airport plans new smoking area in 2026

Passenger numbers top 35m in 2025

Sales of Guinness topped €8m at Dublin Airport this year as record numbers of passengers travelling quenched their thirst, according to airport operator DAA. Picture: Patrick Bolger/Bloomberg

Sales of Guinness topped €8m at Dublin Airport this year as record numbers of passengers travelling quenched their thirst, according to airport operator DAA.

DAA will confirm passenger numbers in January but the final figure for numbers during 2025 will top 35m, on 240,000 flights. During the year the airport sold over 1.2m pints of Guinness.

Spirit sales were strong in duty free, with a total of 409,000 litres of Irish whiskey sold and 133,000 litres of vodka. Some 43 tonnes of Toblerone bars were sold. Passengers at Dublin Airport devoured an Irish breakfast every 50 seconds on average during 2025, according to the end-of-year figures released on New Year's Eve by airport operator daa.

Almost 3m cups of tea and coffee were served during the year while more than 550,000 packets of Tayto were sold.

Passengers checked in a total of 9m suitcases, weighing more than 127,000 tones. 

Dublin Airport carried over 35m passengers in 2025. Picture: Dominic McGrath/PA Wire

"This year has seen the introduction of new lounges, the extension of our Drop & Go parking product to Terminal 1 and the rollout of many new food and drink outlets in both terminals, including the San Marco Italian restaurant and Pret A Manger outlet in Terminal 1, and the new Ryan’s Irish bar in Terminal 2. This year also saw us complete the multi-million euro rollout of new cutting edge C3 scanners in both terminals, which enabled us to remove the old 100ml liquid limit once and for all," said DAA head of media relations Graeme McQueen.

“The great news for passengers is that we've even more improvements coming soon in both terminals to make their experience even better in 2026, including an exciting revamp of the duty free area in Terminal 1, a new lounge in Terminal 1 that’s twice the size of the old lounge and a revamped 51st and Green lounge in Terminal 2. We’re also hopeful of being able to soon announce plans for a new smoking area in terminal - which has been a constant ask from passengers in recent years," added McQueen.