Cathay Pacific reports May 2025 traffic figures, marks reaching 100 destinations

The Cathay Pacific Group, which includes Cathay Pacific, Cathay Cargo, and HK Express, has released its latest set of traffic figures for May 2025. Simultaneously, the airline group has marked serving 100 global destinations for the first time in its history, as well as receiving a string of top awards for its services.

Cathay Pacific, the group’s full-service passenger division, carried 36.1% more passengers in May 2025 compared with May 2024, while capacity in terms of Available Seat Kilometres (ASKs) increased by 31.2% year-on-year. In the first five months of 2025, the number of passengers carried increased by 28.4% compared with the same period in 2024.

“While May has typically been a quieter month for our travel business, this year it exceeded expectations with load factor reaching 84.7% – the highest it has been in the month of May since 2015,” said Lavinia Lau, Chief Customer and Commercial Officer of Cathay Pacific Group. “This was boosted by strong long-haul demand from the early return of student traffic to Hong Kong, and our well-received special fares campaign launched in February. Demand for business travel also remained robust, supported by traffic from Hong Kong to the Chinese Mainland and various long-haul destinations in the Americas and the United Kingdom.”

FiledIMAGE / Shutterstock“Looking ahead, we anticipate demand during the summer travel peak to be healthy, with Southeast Asia being especially popular among customers from our home market. May also marked the first stage of our extensive lounge enhancement plan at Hong Kong International Airport. With The Bridge’s reopening and The Deck serving as an interim First class lounge, we are ensuring that our members and customers continue to enjoy a premium lounge experience during the renovation of The Wing lounges,” added Lau.

Cathay Cargo on the rise

The Group’s cargo division,  Cathay Cargo, carried 12.2% more cargo in May 2025 than in May 2024. Capacity measured by Available Freight Tonne Kilometres (AFTKs) increased by 8% while load factor increased by 0.1 percentage points year on year. In the first five months of 2025, the total tonnage increased by 12.3% compared with the same period in 2024.

“Our cargo business performed well in May, with tonnage 1.8% higher than in April,” said Lau. “Despite the Golden Week holidays, we saw growth in both the Hong Kong and Chinese Mainland markets, with the temporary reduction in tariffs pending an agreement between China and the United States boosting short-term demand. In addition, our Cathay Live Animal solution experienced robust demand, particularly exports of live seafood from Southeast Asia and horses from Australia. Turning to June, we expect that the overall market sentiment will remain reasonable and we will continue to maintain a close watch.”

Ryan Fletcher / Shutterstock“We are also delighted that Cathay Cargo has been named Airline of the Year – Asia at the World Air Cargo Awards 2025 hosted by Air Cargo Week, recognising our commitment to innovation, quality, compliance and operational excellence, and our ongoing efforts to strengthen Hong Kong as a leading global air cargo hub,” she added.

HK Express keeps expanding

The Group’s low-cost passenger division, HK Express, carried more than 640,000 passengers in May 2025, marking an increase of 35.7% year on year, while Available Seat Kilometres (ASKs) grew by 42.6%. In the first five months of 2025, the number of passengers carried increased by 37.2% compared with the same period in 2024.

Suparat Chairatprasert / Shutterstock“In addition to sustaining its network expansion with the launch of new routes to Changzhou and Yiwu in May, HK Express achieved a new milestone by recording its highest monthly seat capacity in its history,” commented Lau. “That said, it will take time for demand growth to catch up with the additional capacity, resulting in a decrease in load factor compared with May last year.”

“For June 2025, HK Express has already launched new services to Cheongju and Daegu, with Miyako-Shimojishima still to come later this month. We have also recently announced flights to Guiyang and Kuala Lumpur-Subang, launching in July and August 2025, respectively.”

Group marks milestones

Speaking further about the Group’s accelerated expansion plans for the rest of 2025 and beyond, Lau was keen to mark the Group’s airlines serving 100 global destinations, with more on the way in the months ahead.  

“As a Group, with the six new destinations added to our global network in May and June 2025, we are delighted to have reached a total of 100 passenger destinations worldwide. This important milestone underscores our commitment to enhancing the global connectivity of our Hong Kong hub, and we won’t stop there. In 2025, we have already announced many new destinations to be joining our network, with more exciting ones to come in the future.

Kittikun Yoksap/ Shutterstock“Throughout 2025, we have been very pleased to receive a number of esteemed accolades across our business units, and we are delighted that Cathay Pacific has been named one of the world’s top three best airlines in 2025 in the prestigious Skytrax World Airline Awards, in addition to being named World’s Best Economy Class Airline and winning World’s Best Inflight Entertainment,” added Lau. “These recognitions encourage us to continue going above and beyond for our customers in pursuit of our vision of becoming one of the world’s greatest service brands.”

RELATED

airBaltic expands from Estonia with new flights to Reykjavik in Iceland

The post Cathay Pacific reports May 2025 traffic figures, marks reaching 100 destinations appeared first on AeroTime.

Go to Source