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The award was made at Routes Europe 2023, the international connectivity event held from 9 to 11 May in Poland, where the Canary Islands were up against government promotion agencies from Italy, Jordan and Malta. With 731 air connections operated by 53 airlines from 147 airports, the Canary Islands are one of the best-connected tourism destinations in the world.

The Canary Islands delegation attended the annual event where the world’s leading airlines, airports and destinations announce their flight schedules. This event allows us to strengthen the presence of our destination among airlines and make sure they have us in their sights when planning sales of their future air capacity.

An intense round of 25 meetings with airlines and airport authorities allowed us to gauge airline satisfaction with the progress of sales to the Canary Islands, not only for the current summer season, but also ahead of winter.

The intense round of meetings held by the Canary Islands delegation at Routes 23 allowed us to gauge airline satisfaction with the progress of sales to the Canary Islands.

Current figures show that seats on sale to the Islands for the upcoming high season (November 2023 to March 2024) stand at 9,385,631, up 434,033 on last winter (+4.8%) and 2.1 million on the winter before Covid (+30.2%).

A key takeaway for the Islands from the event is the ongoing effort to increase connectivity with North America. Another highlight is the improvement in projections for winter connectivity with Nordic countries, where markets have yet to return to pre-pandemic levels.

Routes Europe 2023 highlighted the improved projections for winter connectivity between the Canary Islands and Nordic countries.

Exceeding expectations

Air operators told the Canary Islands delegation that the overall pattern of demand continues to exceed expectations, showing a strong, rapid recovery in Spain and especially the Canary Islands, where some operators expected to see the “champagne effect”: a rapid rise after the covid crisis followed by a levelling off, or even a drop, due to high inflation and the geopolitical situation. However, airlines noted that the region appears to have emerged in a better position, equating to continuing high connectivity and expected announcements of new routes with the Canary Islands for winter.