Airport arrivals decline June at Puerto Vallarta airport, with passenger traffic dipping 0.1% year over year even as first-half 2025 volumes rose 1.2% on strong domestic growth and weaker international bookings.
Puerto Vallarta International Airport saw its June passenger count slip 0.1 percent compared with the same month in 2024, registering 511,100 arrivals versus 511,500 last year. The slight retreat marks a rare downturn during what is traditionally a low-season month, and it comes even as the airport posted a 1.2 percent gain in total traffic for the first half of 2025.
Traffic at the gateway reached 3,805,600 passengers between January and June, up from 3,758,900 over the same period in 2024. That performance kept Puerto Vallarta in line with the broader trend at Grupo Aeroportuario del Pacífico’s (GAP) network of 12 Mexican airports, which together saw a 0.7 percent rise in June traffic. Yet among the large airports in that group, Puerto Vallarta logged the smallest year-over-year margin in the first half: Guadalajara grew 5.6 percent, Tijuana climbed 4.1 percent, Los Cabos added 2.0 percent, Guanajuato expanded 8.1 percent, and Hermosillo rose 6.0 percent.
Domestic and international markets in June told different stories at Puerto Vallarta. Domestic arrivals climbed 5.5 percent year over year, with 273,800 passengers landing on home-market flights in June 2025 versus 259,600 in June 2024. That surge lifted the first-half domestic total to 1,484,000 passengers, a 12.6 percent advance over last year’s 1,317,400.
By contrast, international bookings continued to slide. June saw 237,300 international arrivals, down 5.8 percent from 251,800 a year earlier. Through June, the airport handled 2,321,600 international passengers, marking a 4.9 percent drop from the 2,441,500 recorded in the first six months of 2024. Despite the decline, international volumes still outpaced domestic overall, although June remains one of the few months when domestic arrivals exceed international ones at this terminal.
Seat capacity at Puerto Vallarta increased 2.1 percent in June 2025 compared with June 2024. That added capacity helped carriers carry more travelers even as the ratio of occupied seats to available seats—the load factor—slipped to 82.2 percent from 83.4 percent.
Analysts point to several factors behind the June slowdown in international traffic, including stronger competition on key U.S. routes and lingering currency headwinds that may dampen booking demand among foreign tourists. However, the healthy domestic growth reflects rising interest from Mexican holidaymakers and stronger connectivity within the country’s regional network.