A new report from Eurocontrol has shown that European air traffic continues to grow, and while delays are trending downwards, they “remain high” and “above target levels”.
On Monday (October 6), Eurocontrol published its latest aviation trends report on European air traffic during summer 2025.
From June to mid-September – covering the peak summer season – European air traffic grew 3.3% over the same period in 2024.
During this time, en-route flight delays fell by 31% compared to last summer. Such delays were down across all categories, including capacity (29%), staffing (21%), and weather (41%).
Overall, arrival punctuality came in at 71.6%, up from 65.2% last summer.
However, Eurocontrol notes that performance on delays remains below the EU target of 0.9 minutes per flight.
For full-year 2025 up to September 15, the average delay per flight came in at 1.88 minutes.
There were also 16 days in summer 2025 with more than 200,000 minutes of delays – a significant number, but also a significant reduction from 35 such days in summer 2024.
Speaking with Airline Economics, Eurocontrol said the figures are largely “positive”, but highlight the ongoing lack of capacity at “some” air navigation service providers (ANSPs).
As such, looking ahead to summer 2026, Eurocontrol recommends that ANSPs focus on increasing recruitment of air traffic controllers (ACTOs) and on increasing sector capacities.
Modernisation and digitalisation of air traffic management (ATM) systems must also be accelerated, the group said.
Eurocontrol’s latest report follows several years of ongoing disputes between airlines and regulators on how best to resolve Europe’s issues with flight delays.
Last week, as covered by Airline Economics, Ryanair renewed its call for the EU to mandate that national ATC providers must be fully staffed for each first wave of morning flights, or face fines.
Joining other airlines, Ryanair also called for protecting overflights during national ATC strikes.
This proposal is also backed by easyJet and Airlines for Europe (A4E), a group that represents major carriers including Lufthansa Group, Air France-KLM, and IAG.
Ryanair returned the issue following the publication of internal data showing that, between January and late September 2025, millions of Ryanair passengers faced delays in countries where air traffic controllers have engaged in strike action.
In France, more than 57,000 Ryanair flights and 10 million Ryanair passengers were delayed; in Spain, 34,000 flights and 6 million passengers; and in Germany, 16,000 flights and almost 3 million passengers.
Other proposals previously tabled by A4E for reducing delays include mandatory arbitration before ATC unions can threaten strike action; 21-day advance notifications of strike action from unions; and 72-hour advance notifications from individual staff who plan to participate in strikes.
Many of these proposals already have their supporters at the European Commission, but the political will to implement the changes – which will require the backing of some of the largest member states with the highest number of strikes – is another question.
Speaking with Airline Economics, a European Commission spokesperson said that the Commission will consider the possibility of ensuring “adequate overflight protection” under the upcoming revision of the Air Services Regulation.
The Commission has also identified “several operational measures” which could be implemented to mitigate the effects of strikes.
These include “improving social dialogue” in the air traffic management sector, “early notification” of strikes by trade unions, and “individual notification” by striking staff members – in line with A4E’s proposals.
In the meantime, the spokesperson said that member states must “show solidarity” with one another in an effort to reduce the cross-border impact of strikes.
“We will continue liaising with member states and stakeholders to improve service continuity in the event of strikes,” the spokesperson said.
“We encourage member states to take measures to preserve overflights, and notably to ensure 100% continuity of service for flights crossing the airspace of member states having no part in the strikes.”