Hong Kong’s Q3 capacity up 7%; United Airlines joins top 10; 143 destinations served

With almost 61 million passengers in 2025, Hong Kong was Asia’s 12-busiest airport. While that was overwhelmingly the facility’s best year since 2019, throughput remains far lower than it was once. The record year was 2018, when 74.7 million passengers passed through the doors. It was Asia’s fourth-busiest airport.

Cirium schedule information shows that Hong Kong has benefited from the arrival of multiple new or returning operators recently. They include Air Cambodia, STARLUX, Thai Lion Air and Tibet Airlines in 2024; Air Premia, Cambodia Airways, Etihad Airways and Hebei Airlines in 2025; and Chongqing Airlines, Delta Air Lines, Eastar Jet, Jetstar Japan and Sun PhuQuoc Airways in 2026.

However, like any other airport, some carriers have pulled out. They include 9 Air, AirAsia X, Jiangxi Air, Ruili Airlines and Vistara (subsumed into Air India) in 2024, and Indonesia AirAsia, Royal Air Philippines, Urumqi Air and West Air in 2025.

United Airlines joins the top 10 list

Cirium data for Q3 2026 (July-September) shows that Hong Kong has 10.3 million one-way seats, which is the seventh-best peak summer period on record. Capacity has exceeded what was available in Q3 2025 by 7%, although it remains 11% lower than the pinnacle, achieved eight years ago.

Compared to the same quarter last year, Singapore Airlines has fallen out of the top 10 list, replaced by United Airlines. United’s capacity has risen by a considerable 42% because it has extended its 2-daily flights from Los Angeles to Bangkok and Ho Chi Minh City, with intra-Asia traffic rights available.

With 9% more available seats, Cathay Pacific is, of course, by far the leading operator. It has nearly one in two seats (48%), with the highest number of seats to date. However, this is misleading, as the airline’s former regional unit, Cathay Dragon (and before that Dragonair), was previously counted separately. When that’s included, the combined offering in Q3 2026 is 12% lower than the record.

Cathay’s passenger network encompasses 79 destinations in these three months, with Taipei, Shanghai PVG, Beijing PEK, Singapore, Tokyo NRT, Manila, Osaka KIX, Bangkok BKK, London LHR and Seoul ICN being the top 10 markets. Compared to last year, Cathay now serves Changsha, Chengdu TFU and Seattle. No airport has been removed from the airline’s network in this period.

Taipei remains by far the top destination

Hong Kong’s passenger network consists of 143 destinations served on a non-stop or one-stop basis. Intra-Asia accounts for 79% of the airport’s capacity, followed by North America (7%), Europe (6%), Australasia (5%), the Middle East (2%) and Africa (1%).

The 143 airports are in 42 countries, with mainland China necessarily being by far the leading nation (2.3 million one-way seats; 23% of the total), surpassing Japan (1.5 million), Taiwan (1.2 million), Thailand (610,000) and South Korea (565,000). 48 airports in China are served, followed by 12 in Japan, eight in the US and five each in India, the Philippines and Thailand.

Compared to Q3 2025, Hong Kong has gained or regained flights to these airports in the same period in 2026. While Chengdu CTU was once the sole airport serving that enormous city, international activity had moved to TFU. However, Hong Kong is now linked to both airports. The stated frequencies refer to what is available in August 2026.

• 3 October 2025: Moscow SVO with Aeroflot (2-weekly)
• 14 October 2025: Enshi with Greater Bay (weekly)
• 4 November 2025: Abu Dhabi with Etihad (7-weekly)
• 4 November 2025: Changsha with Cathay (7-weekly)
• 5 March 2026: Pakse with Greater Bay (flights resume in September)
• 30 March 2026: Seattle with Cathay (5-weekly)
• 30 July 2026: Chengdu CTU with Air China (7-weekly), Cathay (14), Hong Kong Airlines (7) and Sichuan Airlines (7)
• 31 July 2026: Nanning with Shenzhen Airlines (3)

With 859,000 one-way seats, Taipei remains Hong Kong’s most-served airport. It has nearly twice the capacity of the second-ranked Tokyo NRT. Taipei has 259-weekly departures in August, which are provided by Cathay (86), EVA Air (46), China Airlines (41), HK Express (28), Hong Kong Airlines (28), Greater Bay (16) and STARLUX (14). Cathay owns the LCC HK Express.