Domestic passenger traffic up 2.4% YoY in April; IndiGo market share flat, Akasa most punctual | Key points

India’s domestic air passenger traffic increased 2.4% year-on-year to 1.32 crore passengers in April 2024, as against 1.29 crore passengers in April 2023, as per the data released by the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) on Tuesday, May 21.

Despite the annual rise, domestic traffic declined slightly month-on-month. The DGCA data showed 1.33 crore passengers travelled through domestic flights in March 2024.

In the first four months of this year – January to April 2024 – the cumulative domestic traffic stood at 5.23 crore, which is 3.8% higher as compared to 5.04 crore in the corresponding period of 2023.

IndiGo market share flat

IndiGo, which is the country’s largest carrier in terms of market share, ferried 5.8 lakh passengers in April as compared to 5.9 lakh in March. The market share remained almost flat at 60.6% in April, as compared to 60.5% in the preceding month.

Air India’s market share in April jumped significantly to 14.2% from 13.1% in March. However, the market share of group airline Vistara declined from 9.6% to 9.2%, with the cancellations triggered due to staff’s protest likely to be one of the reasons.

The market share of Akasa Air remained flat at 4.4%, whereas SpiceJet logged a decline as its share reduced to 4.7% from 5.3%.

Akasa Air most punctual

The on-time performance average, computed on the basis of arrival and departure timings at the four main metro airports – Bangalore, Delhi, Hyderabad, and Mumbai – showed Akasa Air was the most punctual airline in April. Out of the total flights operated by the carrier during the month, 89% were on time.

AIX Connect was the second on the list, with 79.2% flights on time, followed by Vistara with 76.2%, IndiGo with 76.1% and Air India with 72.1%.

Among the poor performers were SpiceJet, with only 64.2% flights on time. The punctuality rate was the worst in the case of Alliance Air at 49.5%.

Cancellation rate

The overall cancellation rate of scheduled domestic airlines for the month of April 2024 was 0.8%, DGCA said. Among major carriers, the cancellation rate was sharpest for Alliance Air at 3.99%, followed by Vistara at 2.4%, and SpiceJet at 1.48%.

Among the flights operated by IndiGo, 0.47% were cancelled during the month. This was lower in case of Air India and Akasa Air, whose cancellation rates stood at 0.21% and 0.03%, respectively.