Across the board, 2023 is set to be Ryanair's best year yet. A larger fleet combined with huge demand has seen the airline breaking its passenger number record month after month last summer. However, not all markets are created equal, and one is lagging behind in its recovery, according to the airline group's CEO, Michael O'Leary, backed up by flight schedule data.

Germany was Ryanair's 4th biggest market in 2019, though it has since fallen behind Ireland in 2022 and France in 2023 to the sixth-biggest market for the low-cost airline. While Germany remains a major market for the Irish LCC, with over 50,000 flights planned across 2023, it is also one of only two countries currently served by the airline where flight numbers are still below 2019 levels.

The figures referred to in this article are departures from a specific country per airline. One should note that the 2023 data are forward-looking and thus subject to change. Russia is excluded when countries are mentioned, as it is only partially in the European continent. Ukraine is also not mentioned as its airspace is currently considered unsafe for airlines due to the ongoing Russian invasion.

Germany isn't growing for Ryanair

According to Ryanair's Micheal O'Leary, Germany is a market that isn't growing for the Irish low-cost carrier. Speaking to Simple Flying at last month's Airlines For Europe Summit in Brussels, O'Leary commented,

"We’ve added capacity [at Düsseldorf Weeze], we’ve added capacity at Hahn, and some of the other German Airports, but frankly, Germany at the moment is a market that is not particularly aggressive or growing for us. We’ll grow much more dramatically in Italy, Spain, Portugal, Greece, and Poland. But Germany is a market in which they have seen the weakest traffic recovery."

The numbers back O'Leary up

According to flight schedule data published by Cirium, Ryanair's planned German departures for 2023 fall over 7,000 short of 2019 numbers. The only other country still served by Ryanair that has not reached 2019 levels is Norway. Norway is Ryanair's 27th of 36 countries served and is 356 departures short of 2019 figures. Here is how Germany compares to the other countries in the top 10.

Ryanair not alone

When you dig further into the numbers and start adding other airlines into the equation, one finds that Ryanair isn't alone in seeing poor recovery in Germany. Of the country's top 20 airlines, 12 are still operating at lower than 2019 levels in the country. When combined, the top 20 airlines are still down some 201,000 flights compared to 2019, with Lufthansa, Eurowings, and easyJet offering vastly reduced schedules compared to 2019.

In fact, easyJet is the biggest loser of the top 20. It was in the 4th place ahead of Ryanair in 2019. In 2023 it is placed ninth on the list, with around 43,600 of its 2019 flights still missing, equating to a drop of 74.13%. Interestingly the largest airline that has seen positive growth in Germany from 2019 to 2023 is rival airline Wizz Air which has 8.13% more flights. Of the top 20 airlines, Coredon has seen the largest growth over the four-year period, an increase of 68.80.

Germany is also the biggest loser in Europe

When you look at Germany's operations as a whole compared to its European neighbors, the situation persists. Current schedule data shows that there will be 720,000 odd departures from Germany in 2023. This is a difference of roughly -247,000 flights from 2019 or a 25.52% drop. The United Kingdom has the second largest deficit between 2019 and 2023 figures, with -118,000 flights planned in 2023, equating to a 10.86% drop.

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While Germany has seen the biggest fall in passenger numbers from 2019 to 2023, it is not the only country on the European continent to see its numbers not returning to pre-COVID levels. According to current flight schedules, Cirium data shows that 30 nations will see a smaller number of flights this year. This compares to just ten expecting to see an increase.

O'Leary still sees hope in Germany

While Germany has seen Ryanair's weakest traffic recovery by country, O'Leary has hope that this won't persist. He told Simple Flying that the airline has a 5-year agreement with Frankfurt Airport on pricing. This was reportedly contingent on the delivery of Terminal 3. When COVID-19 delayed the terminal, Ryanair wanted a two-year extension to the deal, with O'Leary commenting,"[Frankfurt Airport] came under intolerable pressure from Lufthansa, saying “We can’t do that, bla bla bla”."

Looking forward to the future, O'Leary is confident that more German airports will want to do pricing deals with Ryanair, adding,

"I think that German airports will realize in a year or two that having a national champion like Lufthansa that overcharges everybody six, seven, eight hundred euros is not necessarily the way forward, and there’ll be more scope for us to do deals with airports and to grow, but it will take a year or two."

Did you realize that the German aviation industry was so far behind the European recovery? Let us know what you think and why in the comments below!