Busiest flight route in the world is revealed

Have you ever heard of Jeju Island?

Jeju has beaches, caves, volcanoes...and A LOT of visitors (iStock)

The busiest flight route in the world has been revealed, and it’s to a destination you might not have heard of.

More than 13.4 million people travelled on the service from Seoul’s Gimpo Airport to Jeju, an island off the southern coast of the Korean Peninsula, in 2017. This represented a jump of 9.4 per cent from the previous year, making it the most in-demand route in the world.

An average of 180 flights go each day from South Korea’s capital to the island, well-known as a tourist destination in Asia for its beach resorts, volcanic landscape and bizarre Love Land theme park. That makes one every eight minutes.

The analysis of the world’s busiest flight paths was conducted by aviation network Routes.

In second place was the Melbourne to Sydney route, on which 9.9 million passengers flew in 2017 - trounced by the Seoul-Jeju route by 4.4 million.

According to the Routes data, the Asia-Pacific region dominates the top 100 busiest routes by passenger numbers, accounting for more than 70 per cent of the total.

In terms of the busiest international route, Hong Kong to Taipei ranked top, with 6.7 million passengers flying the 802km journey in 2017.

Europe appears in the top 10 busiest international routes just twice, with the Dubai to London Heathrow routes (ranked sixth with 3.2 million passengers in 2017) and New York JFK to London Heathrow (2.9 million) only just making the cut.

Meanwhile, the study found that the route between Bangkok Suvarnabhumi and Chiang Mai is the fastest-growing in the top 100, with a 36 per cent year-on-year spike in two-way passenger numbers.

“This research backs up forecasts that the Asia-Pacific region will be the biggest driver of passenger demand over the next 20 years,” said Steven Small, brand director of Routes.

The top 10 busiest routes in the world

1. Jeju – Seoul Gimpo: 13,460,306 passengers
2. Melbourne – Sydney Kingsford Smith: 9,090,941 passengers
3. Sapporo – Tokyo Haneda: 8,726,502 passengers
4. Fukuoka – Tokyo Haneda: 7,864,000 passengers
5. Mumbai – Delhi: 7,129,943 passengers
6. Beijing Capital – Shanghai Hongqiao: 6,833,684 passengers
7. Hanoi – Ho Chi Minh City: 6,769,823 passengers
8. Hong Kong – Taiwan Taoyuan: 6,719,030 passengers
9. Jakarta – Juanda Surabaya: 5,271,304 passengers
10. Tokyo Haneda – Okinawa: 5,269,481 passengers