Abu Dhabi, UAE – Etihad Airways, the national airline of the United Arab Emirates, has released its traffic statistics for December 2024, finishing the year with continued brisk performance.

The airline welcomed 1.7 million guests during the month, a remarkable increase of more than 20% compared to the same period last year, and a load factor of 87 per cent compared to 84 per cent for December 2023.

Antonoaldo Neves, CEO of Etihad Airways, said: 'December was our busiest month of the year, in the traditionally active holiday season, and we carried 1.7 million passengers, a 22 percent rise on the same month of 2023.

“In the full year of 2024, we carried more than 18 million guests, with a very healthy passenger load factor of 87 percent across the year. More impressively, it represents an 80 percent increase in our total passenger numbers for 2022, underlining our strong growth trajectory over the past two years.

'In December, our network continued to grow as we resumed our service to Nairobi, Kenya, and we are looking forward to starting operations to the new destinations recently announced.”