Welcome to part 2 of this series on the landscape of Indian aviation networks as we head into the busy winter schedule. For this series, I have taken data from booking engines of flights available for sale for the last week of November / early December with 29th November being the median date. In this post, we will take a look at the top 10 domestic stations for the top 5 Indian carriers.
(Read: State of the Nation from avgeeks perspective)
These are the top 10 departure hubs for domestic carriers for November 2024.
| Rank | Airport | Indigo | Air India | Air India Express | Akasa +SpiceJet | Total Nov’ 24 | Total May’ 24 |
| 1 | Delhi | 226 | 169 | 38 | 45 | 478 | 469 |
| 2 | Mumbai | 158 | 118 | 10 | 36 | 322 | 321 |
| 3 | Bengaluru | 186 | 54 | 48 | 30 | 318 | 314 |
| 4 | Hyderabad | 173 | 29.5 | 26 | 10 | 238.5 | 216 |
| 5 | Kolkata | 113 | 26 | 21 | 14 | 174 | 170 |
| 6 | Chennai | 129.5 | 21.5 | 12 | 8 | 171 | 151 |
| 7 | Ahmedabad | 73.5 | 18.5 | 0 | 15 | 107 | 98 |
| 8 | Pune | 55 | 9 | 10 | 15 | 89 | 87 |
| 9 | Goa Dabolim | 38.5 | 12.5 | 11 | 0 | 62 | 51 |
| 10 | Jaipur | 43 | 4 | 12 | 1 | 60 | 52.5 |
While there is no change in the rankings of the top 8 airports, the real surprise is the sharp narrowing of the gap between Kolkata and Chennai with both Indigo and Air India Express adding significant capacity at the latter (though October saw significant short term capacity addition at Kolkata for the Pujo festive peak). Chennai is indeed a surprise given the oft heard social media lament of Chennai airport having missed the south growth bus. With over 25% growth in departures relative to Winter 2023, this can no longer be said to be the case – though of course there is a steep difference between Bengaluru, Hyderabad and Chennai by way of total flights. Interestingly all of this Chennai growth has been outside the Delhi and Mumbai routes – indeed its to other city pairs – for instance Air India express entering a few Indigo monopolies like Chennai to Jaipur, Pune, Bhubaneswar and Thiruvananthapuram. Coupled with Indigo increasing frequency in the intra TN sectors – Chennai to Madurai and Coimbatore are the busiest interstate routes with 9 services daily, the latter only on A320 series aircraft.
Hyderabad and Ahmedabad have also seen significant capacity increases, mostly led by Indigo expanding its network (particularly out of Hyderabad) but sequentially the top growth is in Goa Dabolim and Jaipur, both with winter seasonality of tourism. Dabolim (GOI) is indeed surprising as everyone expected the new greenfield airport at Mopa (GOX) to compete strongly with Dabolim. Given the constraints at this airfield in terms of capacity, it is indeed creditable that GOI has grown and indeed winter has seen Indigo shift some capacity from Mopa to Dabolim.
Indigo remains the leading player in all 10 markets with addition of services particularly visible at Hyderabad, Chennai, Ahmedabad and Goa. While the Air India group network out of Delhi and Mumbai has been stable, the one big change has been the dialling up of the Air India full service carrier network out of Bengaluru with consistent sequential additions and one place where Air India group has kept pace with Indigo on frequency additions. Given the merger activity in the group, one has to wait to see the ramifications in terms of network over the coming months. Akasa has stabilised its operation by way of daily departures at Mumbai and Bengaluru – its two principle hubs but as noted previously, does keep optimising its network regularly.
The big elephant in the room is the impending start of Navi Mumbai and Jewar airports, both of which should be on stream through the summer season next year. While Mumbai T1 is reported to be closing for renovation, Navi Mumbai airport should be off to a strong start given the unlocking of capacity in India’s second largest market and the removal of constraints. What remains to be seen is how much of the Navi Mumbai additions are incremental to the Mumbai market and how many are movements from the existing airport to the new one. Irrespective, it is in this author’s opinion only a matter of time – possibly as early as this winter season itself – where Bengaluru airport (BLR) overtakes Mumbai (BOM) airport and takes second place in the domestic rankings.
Delhi (DEL) should be unlocking more capacity now that its runway constraints are over with 4 active runways (albeit not all available in low visibility situations) and the start of Terminal 1 operations. In this context, how Jewar finds its place and grows will be interesting to watch.
The author, who has a day job in consumer goods, is a self confessed aviation geek with an abiding interest in airline network evolution. A frequent flyer with a passion for travel, free time is spent gathering information on new flights and routes. You can reach him at @BOMLHR on X, Skyscraper city amongst other platforms.