Denver International Airport Sets All-Time Record for Passenger Traffic

Denver International Airport (DEN) set an all-time record for passenger traffic in 2015 with more than 54 million travelers – marking the second consecutive year of record-setting traffic in Denver. 

A total of 54,014,502 passengers traveled though DEN in 2015, an increase of 1 percent over the 53,472,514 passengers in 2014 – which was previously the airport’s busiest year on record. December 2015 was also the busiest December in DEN history, with 4,581,239 passengers, and was the fourth consecutive month of record-setting passenger traffic. The airport saw a total of five record-setting months in 2015: April, September, October, November, and December.

“Denver International Airport had a tremendous year in 2015,” said airport CEO Kim Day. “We celebrated our 20th anniversary, opened the Westin Denver International Airport and an amazing outdoor public plaza, and we saw demand for air travel to and from Denver at historic levels. We are so thankful to our passengers, airlines and business partners for an amazing year – but we aren’t done yet. We will continue to seek out new airlines and destinations, elevate the passenger experience and continue our efforts to put Denver on the world map.”

In December, international passenger traffic increased 4.3 percent. International flights that use the airport’s customs facility had strong gains in 2015, with an increase of 16 percent, while Canadian preclearance flights declined 22 percent due to an economic downturn within the oil industry. That decline caused overall international traffic to be nearly flat in 2015 with 2,192,613 international travelers, compared with 2,208,209 international passengers in 2014.

DEN served 181 destinations around the world during 2015. In 2016, the airport will celebrate several new carriers and new nonstop destinations. Virgin America, a new carrier for DEN, will launch nonstop service to San Francisco beginning March 15. On April 5, United Airlines will begin nonstop flights from Denver to Richmond, Virginia. In May, Lufthansa will begin nonstop service to Munich, Germany while Sun Country Airlines will launch nonstop service to Minneapolis/St. Paul. On June 4, Air Canada will begin daily nonstop service from Denver to Montreal, Quebec, Canada, and Southwest Airlines will begin service to Buffalo, New York, Charleston, South Carolina, and Norfolk, Virginia beginning June 11. 

Mail, freight and express cargo operations saw 50,557,953 pounds of cargo in December 2015, a decrease of 1.1-percent compared to the same month in 2014. In all of 2015, 545,784,431 pounds of cargo were handled at DEN, up 5.1 percent from 519,434,240 pounds of cargo handled during 2014.