German airports are expected to serve 1,544 routes at least weekly this year, down from 1,678 in 2019, while annual passenger flights are forecast to fall from about 1.7 million to just under 1.4 million. The Bundesverband der Deutschen Luftverkehrswirtschaft (BDL) recorded the decline across 26 airports, highlighting a sustained reduction in both network breadth and flight frequency since the pandemic.
Since 2019, 483 routes have been discontinued and 349 new connections introduced. On routes that remain in operation, airlines have removed about 370,000 frequencies while adding 120,000. The reductions have been particularly severe on domestic services that do not feed Frankfurt or Munich hubs, where 55% of routes and 83% of flights have disappeared.
Direct links to European business centres, including Zurich and Warsaw, have also been reduced or withdrawn. By contrast, leisure services to Mediterranean destinations have remained comparatively stable, while the intercontinental network has broadly held its ground. Flights to Russia, Belarus and Ukraine were eliminated following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
The BDL attributes the weaker offer to the slow recovery of German aviation after Covid-19 and higher aviation taxes and government charges. Chief executive Joachim Lang described the loss of direct and frequent links to European business centres as a growing problem for regional economies. The association is presenting the changes in an interactive connectivity atlas.