Brussels Airport Company has confirmed that it expects almost 1.3 million passengers to pass through Zaventem between Saturday 25 April and Sunday 10 May, the two-week period that covers the French-speaking Community’s school break, the Dutch spring vacation and the 1 May public holiday. The figure represents a 7.9 percent increase on the same fortnight in 2025 and would make it the busiest spring-holiday period ever recorded at the airport. Management pointed to the absence of industrial action—last year’s general strike on 29 April forced the cancellation of more than 600 flights—as the main reason for the surge. To cope with the additional demand, the airport is extending security-screening opening hours, adding temporary staff at immigration booths and reopening the seldom-used Pier T remote-boarding gates for peak outbound days. Schengen leisure destinations dominate the departure board, with Malaga, Alicante, Gran Canaria, Bari and Dubrovnik leading bookings; on the long-haul side, Montreal, Newark and Cancún top the list.
![Brussels Airport braces for record 1.3 million spring-holiday travellers]()
Travelers who need to arrange or update visas ahead of these busy weeks—especially for non-Schengen routes like Turkey or Morocco—can save themselves an extra trip to the consulate by using VisaHQ’s digital service. The platform’s Belgium portal (https://www.visahq.com/belgium/) walks users through every requirement, provides real-time status updates and even offers secure courier options, helping passengers clear documentation hurdles before setting foot in Zaventem.
Airport authorities are advising passengers on intra-Schengen flights to arrive two hours before departure, and three hours for non-Schengen routes such as the United Kingdom, Ireland, Turkey and Morocco. Airlines have also tweaked their schedules: Brussels Airlines will up-gauge three daily rotations to Barcelona and Lisbon from Airbus A319 to the larger A320neo, while TUI fly Belgium is wet-leasing a Boeing 787 to meet demand for Cape Verde. Ground-handling companies Aviapartner and Alyzia say they have hired 250 seasonal workers, yet unions warn that recruitment came late and that sickness rates typically rise during holiday peaks; contingency rosters are therefore in place. For corporate mobility managers, the main operational headache is likely to be longer landside dwell times. Several multinational employers headquartered in Brussels’ European quarter are moving Monday-morning and Friday-evening meetings online to spare travelling staff rush-hour trips to Zaventem. Relocation providers are also advising newly arrived assignees to avoid scheduling municipal registration appointments on Monday 4 May—the day the airport expects a record 82 000 passengers—because airport-area traffic routinely clogs the Brussels ring road. Looking further ahead, Brussels Airport says the spring-holiday numbers are an encouraging bell-wether for the critical summer season, when it plans to test the EU’s new Entry/Exit System (EES) biometric kiosks at four border‐control lanes. If those trials run smoothly, the airport believes it can absorb passenger growth of up to 10 percent without significant queuing—even if EES goes live EU-wide in October as planned.
Travelers who need to arrange or update visas ahead of these busy weeks—especially for non-Schengen routes like Turkey or Morocco—can save themselves an extra trip to the consulate by using VisaHQ’s digital service. The platform’s Belgium portal (https://www.visahq.com/belgium/) walks users through every requirement, provides real-time status updates and even offers secure courier options, helping passengers clear documentation hurdles before setting foot in Zaventem.
Airport authorities are advising passengers on intra-Schengen flights to arrive two hours before departure, and three hours for non-Schengen routes such as the United Kingdom, Ireland, Turkey and Morocco. Airlines have also tweaked their schedules: Brussels Airlines will up-gauge three daily rotations to Barcelona and Lisbon from Airbus A319 to the larger A320neo, while TUI fly Belgium is wet-leasing a Boeing 787 to meet demand for Cape Verde. Ground-handling companies Aviapartner and Alyzia say they have hired 250 seasonal workers, yet unions warn that recruitment came late and that sickness rates typically rise during holiday peaks; contingency rosters are therefore in place. For corporate mobility managers, the main operational headache is likely to be longer landside dwell times. Several multinational employers headquartered in Brussels’ European quarter are moving Monday-morning and Friday-evening meetings online to spare travelling staff rush-hour trips to Zaventem. Relocation providers are also advising newly arrived assignees to avoid scheduling municipal registration appointments on Monday 4 May—the day the airport expects a record 82 000 passengers—because airport-area traffic routinely clogs the Brussels ring road. Looking further ahead, Brussels Airport says the spring-holiday numbers are an encouraging bell-wether for the critical summer season, when it plans to test the EU’s new Entry/Exit System (EES) biometric kiosks at four border‐control lanes. If those trials run smoothly, the airport believes it can absorb passenger growth of up to 10 percent without significant queuing—even if EES goes live EU-wide in October as planned.
