Tourist traffic through Jamaica’s largest airport, Montego Bay’s Sangster International, dropped 22 percent in April this year, to 335.600 from 430,400 passengers in 2025, with a year to date drop of 29.2 percent to 1,252,900 from 1,769,400 passengers last year, data released by Grupo Aeroportuario Del Pacifico, operators of Jamaica’s two largest airports, show.
The April numbers represent an improvement over the 25.7 percent fall in March, this year, as well as for the year to date, with a decline for the three months to March of 31 percent. The numbers represent incoming and outgoing passengers and locally based Jamaicans, although not the actual number of tourist traffic, the data provides an accurate proxy for the sector’s performance. Data collated by the Jamaica Tourist Board on the industry are unfortunately only released to the public several months in arrears.
Traffic through Kingston’s Norman Manley dropped 6 percent to 145,700 from 155,000 last and for the year to date it slipped 3.9 percent, from 583,000 to 560,500. Year to date, 414,800 passengers, moved through the country’s capital international airport, with a fall of 3.1 percent versus 428,000 for the same period in 2025.
The Montego Bay airport processed 274,500 incoming and outgoing passengers, down by 31.4 percent from 400,100 in 2025, representing a 17 percent improvement over the 37.7 percent decline for January. For the year to date, traffic dropped 34.7 percent to 559,000 from 856,300 in the prior year.
At the same time, traffic passing through Kingston Norman Manley slipped marginally from 137,800 in September last year to 137,400.
Passenger traffic traversing Kingston’s Norman Manley international Airport climbed a robust 13.8 percent last December to 177,400 up from 155,900 in December 2023 and grew just by 1.7 percent, from 1,748,100 in 2023 to 1,777,100 in 2024 Tourism Analytics.com reports, quoting data form Grupo Aeroportuario del Pacifico, operators of in Jamaica two major airports.