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Ryanair revealed on Wednesday that it will be cutting one million seats to and from Spain this winter.
The budget airline said that it will be slashing its capacity for this winter by 10 per cent, or 400,000 seats in the Canary Islands and 41 per cent, or 600,000 seats in Spanish regions. In total, it will result in one million seats being axed this year and an annual reduction of two million seats.
The budget carrier has blamed this move on uncompetitive and excessive airport charges implemented by Spanish airport operator AENA, which manages all key Spanish airports, as well as a number of heliports.
AENA has recently announced that it will be implementing a 6.6 per cent hike in airline fees from 2026 onwards, which will be the highest in more than 10 years, despite the operator seeing record profits in 2025.
“The decision by AENA and its shareholders (including the Spanish Government) to increase already uncompetitive airport charges by 6.62 per cent next year is the latest evidence that the monopolistic airport operator has no interest in developing traffic at Spain’s regional airports, and simply wants to focus on making record profits from the country’s main airports,” Eddie Wilson, CEO of Ryanair DAC, the main operating airline of the group, said in a press release.
“This excessive increase means that most of Ryanair’s capacity for winter 2025 in regional Spain will be moved outside Spain to more efficient airports that want to develop traffic, particularly those in Italy, Morocco, Croatia, Sweden and Hungary.”
Which Spanish airports will see the most cuts?
Ryanair is shutting its two-aircraft base in Santiago. It will also stop all flights to Tenerife North airport from the start of this winter, as well as to Vigo airport from 1 January next year.
The budget airline’s base at Valladolid airport, which has been closed since winter 2024 will stay closed this winter as well. Similarly, the base at Jerez airport will be closed for the whole duration of the winter 2025 season.
Other regional airports will also be affected. This includes Santiago airport, which will experience a cut of 38 per cent, as well as Zaragoza airport, with a 45 per cent decrease.
The Asturias airport will see flights slashed by 16 per cent, whereas flights to the Vitoria airport will reduce by 2 per cent. An additional 36 connections between regional Spain and the Canary Islands will also be cut.
However, the airline intends to keep growing at major airports like Madrid and Barcelona.
“These cuts will further harm Spain’s already vulnerable regional airports and will inevitably lead to a loss of investment, connectivity, tourism and employment in regional Spain, as many routes will become economically unviable,” the budget carrier claimed in a press release.
Currently, Ryanair says it contributes about €28 billion to Spain’s gross domestic product (GDP).
What does this mean for European travellers?
Spain has long been one of Europe’s most popular holiday destinations. In July this year, it welcomed 11 million international visitors, the highest monthly total in its history.
However, Ryanair’s move to reduce flights to and from Spain could make travel to the country significantly more expensive for European travellers, especially to more remote areas.
This could be in the form of more expensive and inconvenient flights and overall disruption to their travel plans. It comes at a time when visitors are already dealing with an ongoing cost-of-living crisis.