Haneda Soars as Japan’s Busiest Airport

Haneda was Japan’s busiest airport in 2017 with 85.68 million passengers, which was more than twice as many as Narita in second place. The Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport, and Tourism’s annual report on air transport statistics found that approximately 80% or 68.6 million of its passengers used domestic flights. Haneda came third for number of passengers using international flights with 17.12 million, behind Narita in first place with 31.50 million and Kansai with 21.81 million passengers.

Passenger Traffic by Airport in Japan in 2017 (Domestic and International Routes Combined)

	Airport	Passengers (million)
1	Haneda	85.68
2	Narita International	38.96
3	Kansai International	28.71
4	Fukuoka	23.98
5	New Chitose (Sapporo)	23.09
6	Naha	21.16
7	Itami (Osaka International)	15.68
8	Chūbu Centrair International	11.52
9	Kagoshima	5.69
10	Sendai	3.44

Compiled by Nippon.com based on data from the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport, and Tourism.

There are 101 airfields in Japan, including joint-use Japan Self-Defense Forces and civil aviation airports and private facilities. By passenger traffic, the top eight airports were all used by more than 10 million passengers a year. Passenger traffic exceeded 1 million people a year as far down as Yamaguchi Ube Airport in thirty-first place.

The two busiest routes by far were Haneda–New Chitose (Sapporo), with 9.05 million passengers, and Haneda–Fukuoka, with 8.54 million passengers. From six in the morning onward, both routes have an average of three or four flights an hour departing or landing and demand is steady due to the high level of convenience. Moreover, calculating in the Narita–New Chitose route (1.82 million passengers) and the Narita–Fukuoka route (1.15 million passengers), there were around 10 million people traveling from Tokyo to the two destinations in 2017. Haneda soars ahead as Japan’s most dominant domestic airport, with eight out of the top ten routes passing through.

Domestic Flight Routes by Passenger Traffic

	Route	Passengers (million)
1	Haneda–New Chitose (Sapporo)	9.05
2	Haneda–Fukuoka	8.54
3	Haneda–Naha	5.80
4	Haneda–Itami (Osaka)	5.45
5	Haneda–Kagoshima	2.40
6	Haneda–Kumamoto	1.97
7	Fukuoka–Naha	1.92
8	Haneda–Hiroshima	1.89
9	Narita–New Chitose (Sapporo)	1.82
10	Haneda–Nagasaki	1.73

Compiled by Nippon.com based on data from the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport, and Tourism.

(Translated from Japanese. Banner photo © Pixta.)