Ryanair Slashes One Million Seats on Spanish Routes
Ryanair has made headlines once again, and this time it’s for cutting a huge number of flights across Spain. The airline announced that one million seats are being removed from its Spanish winter schedule, including around 400,000 from the Canary Islands alone. For many British travellers who look forward to winter sun, this will come as a major blow.
The cuts are spread widely across Spain, with some airports being hit harder than others. In fact, six hundred thousand seats are being taken away from regional airports, which works out to around a 41 percent drop in available capacity. For the Canary Islands, the reduction is smaller, at about 10 percent, but still significant for such a popular holiday destination.
Some routes will disappear completely. All flights to Tenerife North will be suspended once the winter season begins, and flights to Vigo are scheduled to stop from January 1, 2026. Ryanair is also shutting down its two-aircraft base in Santiago. Several other airports are facing steep reductions: Zaragoza will lose 45 percent of its capacity, Santander 38 percent, Asturias 16 percent, and Vitoria two percent. On top of that, the airports in Valladolid and Jerez will remain closed until at least the winter of 2025. Overall, the airline is pulling back 36 different direct connections between regional Spain and the Canary Islands.
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The reason behind these drastic cuts lies in a dispute with AENA, the Spanish airport operator. AENA has announced plans to raise passenger fees by 6.62 percent next year. Ryanair has called this increase unreasonable, saying it makes many regional routes unviable. The airline warned that these moves will damage already vulnerable regional airports, while also threatening tourism, jobs, and local investment.
Ryanair’s CEO, Eddie Wilson, explained that capacity will instead be shifted to airports in countries like Italy, Morocco, Croatia, Sweden, and Hungary—places described as more efficient and more eager to encourage traffic growth. He also accused AENA of focusing on profits from Spain’s larger airports rather than supporting growth in the smaller regional hubs.
The reaction has not been quiet. AENA’s chief executive, Maurici Lucena, fired back by accusing Ryanair of blackmail and greed, pointing out that ticket prices on Ryanair’s own services have risen more sharply than the proposed airport fee increase. Meanwhile, Spain’s Labour Minister, Yolanda DÃaz, has said she plans to meet with Ryanair’s leadership to ensure labour laws are being respected as these cuts take effect.
Despite all this, Ryanair is still seeing strong overall passenger growth. In August, the airline carried 21 million passengers, which is a two percent increase compared with the same month last year. Even with reduced operations in Spain, the company expects to carry more passengers overall this financial year, thanks to moving planes and seats into other markets where costs are lower.
For now, though, travellers hoping for cheap and easy winter escapes to Spain may find fewer options and higher fares. The dispute between Ryanair and AENA looks far from settled, and the impact will be felt most by those smaller Spanish airports that depend heavily on budget airline traffic.
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