New figures from the European Union's statistics office, Eurostat, show the total number of passengers travelling by air in the EU reached 820 million in 2022 - a substantial increase of 119% compared with the 374 million passengers in 2021.
Eurostat said this follows the big decline of 73% in 2020 compared with 2019 due to Covid-19 pandemic restrictions.
Today's figures show that all EU countries registered an increase in the number of passengers carried by air transport compared with 2021.
These increases varied among the EU countries, with the largest reported in Ireland, which saw a big jump of 256%, while passenger numbers in Slovakia and Finland were both 203% higher.
The lowest increases were seen in Cyprus (+69%), Bulgaria (+74%) and Greece (+80%), Eurotat added.
Today's figures also reveal that the top five EU airports remained the same as in 2021, but all recorded substantial increases.
Paris/Charles de Gaulle registered 57.5 million passengers last year, an increase of 119%, while Amsterdam/Schiphol saw 52.5 million passengers to mark an increase of 106%.
Passenger numbers at Madrid/Barajas soared by 115% to 49.8 million, while Frankfurt/Main was up 97% to 48.8 million and Barcelona/El Prat recorded 41.2 million passengers, a rise of 123%.
Lisboa Airport was sixth with 34.6 million passengers carried but saw the highest increase in the top 10, with an increase of 184%.
Eurostat said that Paris-Orly registered the smallest percentage increase in number of passengers carried in 2022 compared with 2021 but still saw a rise of 86%.
