British passengers drive Alicante airport to a record-breaking 1.6 million in March
Alicante-Elche airport is growing faster than almost every other major airport in Spain
Alicante-Elche Miguel Hernández Airport has broken its own monthly record once again, handling 1,609,368 passengers in March 2026, a 9.1% increase on the same month last year and the highest figure ever recorded for that month at the airport.
The numbers are particularly impressive given that March still technically falls within the winter season.
In the first quarter of the year alone, the airport handled 3,945,150 passengers, up 6.6% on the same period in 2025 and already accounting for roughly a fifth of the airport's entire passenger volume for the whole of last year.
The international market continues to drive the growth, with 1,417,924 international passengers recorded in March, up 11.2% year-on-year. British travellers topped the table by some distance, with 536,966 passengers, followed by Germany with 105,409, the Netherlands with 103,575, Poland with 97,995 and Belgium with 85,961.
Domestic traffic dipped slightly, down 4.5% to 191,006 passengers, though that's partly attributed to the ongoing recovery of rail services following a train accident in January.
In terms of flight movements, March saw 10,097 operations handled, up 7.5% on last year, with the first quarter total reaching 25,620 movements, a 6.3% increase on the same period in 2025.
Those figures have cemented Alicante's position as the fourth busiest airport in Spain, behind only Madrid, Barcelona and Málaga, and ahead of Palma, Gran Canaria and Tenerife South. It's also the second fastest-growing airport among Spain's top ten, with only Málaga posting slightly higher growth at 9.4%.
To put the local performance in context, the national average growth across all Aena-managed airports in Spain for March was 3.9%, meaning Alicante is growing at more than double the national rate.
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