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When Will Air Travel Return to Pre-Pandemic Levels?

Published

2 years ago

December 7, 2022

Julie R. Peasley

Creator Program Ambassador

Article/Editing:

Carmen Ang

when will air travel return to pre-pandemic levels?

When Will Air Travel Return to Pre-Pandemic Levels?

Many industries were hit hard by the global pandemic, but it can be argued that air travel suffered one of the most severe blows.

The aviation industry as a whole suffered an estimated $370 billion loss in global revenue because of COVID-19. And while air travel has been slowly recovering from the trough, flight passenger traffic has yet to fully bounce back.

Where is the industry at in 2022 compared to pre-COVID times, and when is air passenger travel expected to return to regular levels? This graphic by Julie R. Peasley uses data from IATA to show current and projected air passenger ridership.

Air Travel Traffic: 2021 and 2022

After an incredibly difficult 2020, the airline industry started to see significant improvements in travel frequency. But compared to pre-pandemic levels, there’s a lot of ground to cover.

In 2021, overall passenger numbers only reached 47% of 2019 levels. This influx was largely driven by domestic travel, with international passenger numbers only reaching 27% of pre-COVID levels.

Passenger numbers (% of 2019)	2021	2022
International	27%	69%
Domestic	61%	93%
Africa	46%	76%
Asia Pacific	40%	68%
Caribbean	44%	72%
Central America	72%	96%
Europe	40%	86%
Middle East	42%	81%
North America	56%	94%
South America	51%	88%
Industry-wide	47%	83%

From a regional perspective, Central America experienced one of the fastest recoveries. In 2021, overall passenger numbers in the region had reached 72% of 2019 levels, and they are projected to reach 96% by the end of 2022.

In fact, the Americas as a whole has seen a quick recovery. Both North America and South America also reached above 50% of 2019 ridership in 2021, and are projected to reach 94% and 88% ridership in 2022, respectively.

On the opposite end of the spectrum, Asia Pacific has experienced the slowest recovery. This is likely due to stricter lockdowns and travel restrictions put into effect in this region (which was harder hit by SARS in 2003), especially in places like Shanghai.

Forecasting Traffic in 2023 and Beyond

While recovery has looked different from region to region, airlines are largely expected to see a full recovery to their ridership levels by 2025.

Forecasted Passengers (% of 2019)	2023	2024	2025
International	82%	92%	101%
Domestic	103%	111%	118%
Africa	85%	93%	101%
Asia Pacific	84%	97%	109%
Caribbean	82%	92%	101%
Central America	102%	109%	115%
Europe	96%	105%	111%
Middle East	90%	98%	105%
North America	102%	107%	112%
South America	97%	103%	108%
Industry-wide	94%	103%	111%

This recovery is a signifier of a much broader mindset shift, as governments continue to reassess their COVID-19 management strategies.

But while the future seems promising, IATA stressed that the forecast does not take into account the potential impact of the Russia-Ukraine conflict and other geopolitical concerns, which could have far-reaching consequences on the global economy (and travel) in the coming years.

This article was published as a part of Visual Capitalist's Creator Program, which features data-driven visuals from some of our favorite Creators around the world.

Related Topics:tourism air travel pandemic economy COVID impact aviation pandemic impact air traffic

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Business

Mapped: The World’s Top Financial Centers in 2025

See which cities are dominating global finance in this 2025 ranking of the world’s top financial centers.

Published

2 days ago

May 15, 2025

Marcus Lu

Mapped: The World’s Top Financial Centers in 2025

This was originally posted on our Voronoi app. Download the app for free on iOS or Android and discover incredible data-driven charts from a variety of trusted sources.

Key Takeaways

The 37th edition of the Global Financial Centres Index (GFCI 37) ranks the competitiveness of 119 financial hubs
Little has changed at the top of the index, with New York, London, and Hong Kong continuing their long-standing dominance

Financial centers are a core pillar of the modern economy, channeling capital, facilitating trade, and driving innovation across the world.

In this graphic, we visualized the world’s top 40 most competitive financial centers, using data from the 37th edition of the Global Financial Centres Index (GFCI 37).

Data & Methodology

The GFCI 37 was compiled using 140 quantitative measures from sources like the World Bank, OECD, and UN.

These measures are combined with assessments collected by respondents to the GFCI online questionnaire. In total, the GFCI 37 used 31,314 assessments from 4,946 respondents.

The data we used to create this graphic is listed below.

City	GFCI 37 Rank	GFCI 37 Rating
🇺🇸 New York	1	769
🇬🇧 London	2	762
🇭🇰 Hong Kong	3	760
🇸🇬 Singapore	4	750
🇺🇸 San Francisco	5	749
🇺🇸 Chicago	6	746
🇺🇸 Los Angeles	7	745
🇨🇳 Shanghai	8	744
🇨🇳 Shenzhen	9	743
🇰🇷 Seoul	10	742
🇩🇪 Frankfurt	11	741
🇦🇪 Dubai	12	740
🇺🇸 Washington DC	13	739
🇮🇪 Dublin	14	738
🇨🇭 Geneva	15	737
🇱🇺 Luxembourg	16	736
🇫🇷 Paris	17	735
🇳🇱 Amsterdam	18	734
🇺🇸 Boston	19	733
🇨🇳 Beijing	20	732
🇨🇭 Zurich	21	731
🇯🇵 Tokyo	22	730
🇨🇦 Toronto	23	729
🇰🇷 Busan	24	728
🇯🇪 Jersey	25	727
🇺🇸 Miami	26	726
🇨🇦 Montreal	27	725
🇦🇺 Melbourne	28	724
🇬🇧 Edinburgh	29	723
🇦🇺 Sydney	30	722
🇨🇦 Vancouver	31	721
🇬🇧 Glasgow	32	720
🇨🇭 Lugano	33	719
🇨🇳 Guangzhou	34	718
🇨🇳 Qingdao	35	717
🇺🇸 San Diego	36	716
🇩🇪 Berlin	37	715
🇦🇪 Abu Dhabi	38	714
🇨🇳 Chengdu	39	713
🇯🇵 Osaka	40	712

Areas of Competitiveness

The quantitative factors used in the GFCI model are grouped into five areas of competitiveness:

Business environment: Transparency and stability of systems, regulatory complexity
Human capital: Access to skill professionals, investment in education
Infrastructure: Quality of physical and digital infrastructure
Financial sector development: Accessibility to clients, development of digital solutions
Reputation: Trustworthiness of legal and regulatory systems

Regional Insights

We’ve summarized the main highlights from each GFCI region below.

North America

North America has four centers in the top 10: New York, San Francisco, Chicago, and Los Angeles. The most improved within North America are Miami and Vancouver, which both climbed over 10 places in the ranking.

Western Europe

London is the region’s dominant center, with seven other cities featuring in the top 20. The average rating across Western Europe increased by 2.14%.

Asia Pacific

Asia Pacific has six centers in the top 20, with four belonging to China (Hong Kong SAR, Shanghai, Shenzhen, Beijing). Looking elsewhere, Hangzhou, New Delhi, Kuala Lumpur, Ho Chi Minh City, and Manila all rose six or more places.

Middle East & Africa

The region’s leading centers are Dubai and Abu Dhabi, with Dubai climbing four places to 12th in GFCI 37. Meanwhile, Tel Aviv, Kuwait City, and Johannesburg each fell more than 10 places.