According to data released on Monday by the Clark County Department of Aviation, Las Vegas’ Harry Reid International Airport had the third-highest monthly passenger volume in its history in July.
According to airport officials, 4.946 million passengers arrived at and left the Las Vegas airport in July, up 1.7% over the same month in 2022. After 5.186 million passengers in October 2022 and 4.953 million in May 2023, it was the third-highest monthly passenger total.
With July’s numbers, the year-to-date total of passengers has reached 33.096 million, which is 13.5% more than the first seven months of 2022. Due to the large number of travelers in July, Southern Nevada is on course to surpass the record 52.7 million passengers set in 2022.
Executives at the airport have been warned to revisit their plans to construct a backup airport in the Ivanpah Valley, south of Las Vegas, as a result of the continual increase in the number of passengers served at Reid.
Rosemary Vassiliadis, director of the Clark County Department of Aviation, confirmed in a February interview that growth at Reid is on a trajectory to meet its capacity of between 63 million and 65 million annual passengers by about 2030. According to her, 2037 would be the earliest that a new reliever airport between Jean and Primm, south of Las Vegas, could become operational.
With 290,546 passengers arriving for the month of July, up 13.5% from the previous month, international traffic to Reid continues to improve. With 1.8 million passengers in total after seven months, the total is 41.4% ahead of what it was in 2017.
With 4.6 million passengers, a 1.1% rise over the previous year, domestic traffic grew further. The quantity of seats entering the Las Vegas market is increasing, which is why passenger counts are continuing to rise.
Southwest Airlines, the market leader, has more seats arriving at Reid than ever before, and the carrier is filling them. In July, 1.9 million passengers flew Southwest, an increase of 10.3% from the same month last year.
Three of the top five domestic airlines flying to Las Vegas saw decreases for the month: Spirit was down 6% to 642,512 passengers, American was down 7.9% to 360,157, and Frontier was down 18.9% to 359,196. Meanwhile, Delta Air Lines saw an increase of 7.4% to 436,910 passengers.
On the international side, Canadian discounter Westjet led all foreign carriers with 76,365 passengers, a 44.5% increase over last year. Air Canada came in second with 46,516 passengers, an increase of 8.5%, and Mexican budget carrier Volaris came in third with 26,816, an increase of 21.5%.
The number of travelers using Reid International’s westside terminals—which also handle traffic from helicopter flight tours—fell by 4.5% to 86,405 in July. Westside Terminal traffic over seven months is stable, rising 0.7% to 562,158 passengers over 2022.
