The number of passengers passing through Istanbul International Airport exceeded 40 million in a year of its official opening, surpassing the population of major cities of the world, such as the Japanese capital Tokyo, the capital of India, New Delhi, the Chinese cities of Shanghai, Brazil, Sao Paulo, Mexico City, Mexico City and Cairo.
During the year, the airport witnessed 9,872,793 domestic flights, while the number of outbound flights reached 30,597,252, with a total of 40,470,455 passengers.
According to the figures, the airport has outperformed the population of the world's busiest metropolitan cities such as Tokyo with 37 million, New Delhi with 28 million and Shanghai with 25 million.
The number of passengers traveling through Istanbul's domestic airport since the start of the operation with full capacity in its first phase between April and September last year was 8,523,000, while the number on external routes was 26,733,702.
Scheduled flights through the first phase of the airport began partially on October 31, 2018, and then fully following the closure of Ataturk International Airport on April 7.
Istanbul Airport was built on an area of 76.5 million square meters, and contributed to the construction of about 10,000 workers, and is scheduled to complete the construction of the other stages of the airport before 2023.
The new airport consists of six runways, with a capacity of 500 aircraft, and is equipped with an open and closed garage for about 70 thousand cars.
The first phase will have a capacity of 90 million passengers per year while it will be able to handle 200 million passengers after all stages of the airport.