Airport charges: what it costs to fly in

What a turnaround is made of

Almost everywhere the bulk of a turnaround is passenger charges and security, not the weight-based landing charge. So charges grow with the load factor, not just with aircraft size: a full A320 in Amsterdam costs noticeably more than a half-empty one.

The tariff is published by the airport operator or the regulator (in Europe under Directive 2009/12/EC, with annual consultations with airlines); some government charges are in the country's Aeronautical Information Publication (AIP, section GEN 4.1). A country may have one document for all its airports (Aena in Spain, ANA in Portugal, ACSA in South Africa, FAAN in Nigeria).

Russia: each airport has its own price list, often separate for Russian and foreign carriers and for domestic and international routes; rates are entered without VAT (a tax, not a charge); at regulated airports these are the maximum rates set by the FAS (Russia's competition authority). China: one state scheme from the CAAC — on domestic routes the rate depends on the airport class, on international routes it is the same for the whole country, so a turnaround from Frankfurt is identical at all ten Chinese airports.

How far the calculator's estimate is from reality

A320 turnaround (78 t, 148 passengers, flight from Frankfurt, July) at every tariff in the data, EUR. Dot — the regional median (this is now the calculator's estimate for an airport in that region without a tariff), line — from the cheapest airport to the most expensive; orange — the old one-size-fits-all estimate. Turnarounds where the landing or passenger charge is not computed (tariff only partly entered) are excluded. For Russian airports where the price list for Russian carriers is entered, the reference flight is domestic, from Sheremetyevo.

By airport

The same turnaround, computed by the calculator's engine for each tariff, EUR. Hatching marks where some charges are not computed: the landing or noise charge needs the A320's noise category under the airport's rules, and the aircraft type reference does not have it yet.

Rates are in the document's currency, converted at an approximate rate (for comparison only). There is no time series: tariffs were collected as of one date; in Europe tariffs are revised annually.

Table for the calculation

“Flight vs estimate”, EUR — how much more (+) or less (−) a flight to or from this airport costs than with the estimate: (turnaround − estimate) ÷ 2. The old one is 2,369 EUR for any airport; the regional estimate is the median of the region's tariffs (for an airport with a tariff it simply shows how typical it is for its region). The superscript numbers link to the tariff document.

What we change in the calculator

1. ✓ Built into the calculator68 tariffs are already in the data (data/charges/) — these airports are calculated from the document, with a reference to the section.
2. ✓ Built into the calculatorAn estimate by region instead of one for all (decision 234). For an airport without a tariff — the regional median: the old formula 9.5·MTOW + 11·pax × the region's k (Europe ×1.39, Russia and CIS ×0.67, India ×1.08, Asia and Middle East ×0.84, Africa ×2.98; outside the regions ×1.10), flagged orange as “estimate”. Africa rests on five tariffs from three documents — its multiplier is the shakiest.
3. ✓ Built into the calculatorAn estimate for the “other end” (decision 234). If only one airport has a tariff, the other is costed at its region's estimate, and that part counts towards the “made-up” share.
4. ⚑ Mind when entering dataType noise category. Without it no landing charge is computed in Amsterdam, Brussels and Malpensa — add the category to the aircraft type reference under each airport's rules.
5. ⚑ Mind when entering dataDoes not fit the schema (outside the calculation for now): night surcharges, NOx and CO₂ charges, per-minute parking, volume and new-route discounts.

How it was checked

The article covers all 68 airport tariffs entered into the calculator from published documents. Unofficial community data on Russian airports is used in the calculation but not shown here: there is no way to check how it was collected.

• October wave — 32 tariffs. Nine research agents searched 51 airports for the current tariff (operator, regulator or AIP), mapped it into the calculator's schema and checked it with a reference turnaround; logs — 568 steps, 253 verbatim quotes (trace/). Five other agents checked every file against the primary source (verify/): 826 of 846 rates matched; discrepancies in 8 files (DNAA, DNMM, EDDH, LGAV, LPFR, LPPT, LTAI, VOMM) were fixed.
• Entered earlier — 36 tariffs (September 2026): Frankfurt — the calculation benchmark (its reference turnaround matches the airport's own calculator), pilot airports in Europe, Russia (reference: Sheremetyevo), China (one CAAC scheme), India, Doha, Narita, Almaty. Checked with a reference turnaround and a rule-by-rule review; the check date is in each file.