Istanbul Airport will have 286 passenger destinations in the first week of summer – the highest in recent years – with 4,155 weekly flights each way.

It’ll be up from 115 destinations in the same week in devastating 2020 and from 284 in 2019, OAG data shows.

Turkish Airlines is of course overwhelmingly dominant, with 281 destinations and an 89% share of flights.  This has risen from 81% before coronavirus primarily due to the end of AtlasGlobal, by far Istanbul Airport’s second-largest airline.

Just 17% of Istanbul Airport’s destinations will have more than one carrier.  Most of these are either point-to-point ethnic (Saudi Arabia, Algeria, Iraq), aligned to Turkish Airlines or Star Alliance, other sixth freedom carriers, or to Russia.  Kuwait, for example, will have four airlines.

With 73% of all flights, the international market will reign supreme.  121 foreign countries will be served, with Germany, Russia, Italy, the UK, and Ukraine the top-five by flights.

By contrast, Mozambique and Zambia will be Istanbul Airport’s least-served with two weekly apiece.  They will be joined by the likes of Chad, Cuba, Eritrea, Mongolia, and Tajikistan, each with three.

Complementing 45 domestic destinations will be 103 across Europe, 53 in Africa, 40 in Asia, 25 in the Middle East, 12 in North America, and eight across Latin America.

Vancouver, a new route, will begin three-weekly from 9 March.