---
title: "Flight disruption statistics, October 2026"
url: https://flightcompensations.com/data/2026-10
dataset: https://flightcompensations.com/data/2026-10.json
csv: https://flightcompensations.com/data/2026-10.csv
month: 2026-10
published: 2026-11-02
publisher: FlightCompensations
press: support@flightcompensations.com
license: "Free to quote and reuse with attribution to FlightCompensations and a link to the release URL."
summary: "Sunday 4 October 2026 was the worst day of the month: 1,140 flights reached the compensation threshold, 3.2 times the daily average."
---

# Flight disruption statistics, October 2026

In October 2026 we observed 676,849 passenger flights through 160 monitored airports. **10,951 of them (1.6%) reached the compensation threshold**: a verified arrival three hours or more late, or a cancellation. Passengers on them could have been owed up to €648.3M. These flight disruption statistics come from our own monitoring.

## What stood out in October 2026?

- Sunday 4 October 2026 was the worst day: 1,140 flights reached the threshold, 3.2 times the daily average.
- The share of flights that reached the threshold held at 1.6%, the same as in September 2026.
- Among airlines with at least 500 observed flights, LL had the highest rate: 9.5%, or 437 of 4,597 flights.
- BJ had the lowest: 0.0% of 634 flights.
- LL moved the most on the month before: from 3.6% to 9.5%.
- Barcelona El Prat (BCN) was the most disrupted large departure airport: 6.5% of 30,109 departures.
- The worst route with at least 30 flights was LHR to RUH: 79 of 179 flights reached the threshold.
- Cancellations made up 77.2% of the disruptions; the rest were arrivals three hours or more late.
- Passengers on these flights could have been owed up to €648.3M under the law, if every seat was full and every claim valid.

## What can the October 2026 figures tell you, and what can they not?

Read these limits before quoting a number.

- **A sample, not the market.** We watch 160 airports, so every count is a floor on what happened in Europe.
- **Qualifying is not owed.** The airline can still show extraordinary circumstances, such as a storm or an air traffic control restriction.
- **The money is a ceiling.** It assumes every seat was full and every passenger eligible. We do not know what airlines actually paid.
- **One aircraft, one flight.** A codeshare sold under several flight numbers counts once, under the airline that operates it.
- **Local dates.** A flight belongs to the month of its scheduled departure, in local time at the origin.

## How many flights were disrupted in October 2026?

The flight delay statistics and the cancellation statistics are counted separately, because the law treats them differently. A delay qualifies from three hours at arrival. A cancellation qualifies on the day the airline files it; the notice it gave decides each claim later.

- Flights observed: 676,849, through 160 monitored airports.
- Qualifying disruptions: 10,951 (1.6% of flights observed).
- Cancellations: 8,454.
- Arrivals three hours or more late: 2,497.
- Compensation passengers could have been owed: up to €648.3M.
- In September 2026: 12,273 of 765,291 flights (1.6%).

![Bar chart of flights reaching the compensation threshold on each day of October 2026](/data/2026-10/daily.svg)

## Which airline delay rates were highest in October 2026?

Carriers ranked by the share of their observed flights that qualified. A carrier needs 200 observed flights to appear here; the change column compares the rate with September 2026. "Up to" is the most the law could have put on the airline. Each name opens that airline's month-by-month record; the [airline delay rankings](/data/airlines) hold the newest month. The [CSV](/data/2026-10.csv) carries every carrier from 20 flights.

| Carrier | Flights | Qualifying | Cancelled | Rate | vs September | Up to |
| --- | ---: | ---: | ---: | ---: | ---: | ---: |
| [LL (LL)](/data/airlines/ll) | 4,597 | 437 | 368 | 9.5% | +5.9 pts | €19.2M |
| [KK (KK)](/data/airlines/kk) | 203 | 19 | 16 | 9.4% | +6.5 pts | €1.1M |
| [U8 (U8)](/data/airlines/u8) | 206 | 15 | 3 | 7.3% | −8.1 pts | €905,500 |
| [BZ (BZ)](/data/airlines/bz) | 518 | 33 | 9 | 6.4% | −3.7 pts | €2.0M |
| [OA (OA)](/data/airlines/oa) | 386 | 23 | 23 | 6.0% | +4.9 pts | €977,500 |
| [EC (EC)](/data/airlines/ec) | 5,421 | 303 | 247 | 5.6% | +2.5 pts | €14.4M |
| [GR (GR)](/data/airlines/gr) | 402 | 19 | 18 | 4.7% | +2.4 pts | €807,500 |
| [IZ (IZ)](/data/airlines/iz) | 657 | 29 | 8 | 4.4% | −1.7 pts | €2.1M |
| [XY (XY)](/data/airlines/xy) | 211 | 9 | 9 | 4.3% | +4.3 pts | €1.5M |
| [Qatar Airways (QR)](/data/airlines/qr) | 11,713 | 496 | 422 | 4.2% | +1.5 pts | €23.3M |
| [XK (XK)](/data/airlines/xk) | 787 | 32 | 32 | 4.1% | +2.9 pts | €1.4M |
| [Loganair (LM)](/data/airlines/lm) | 1,352 | 53 | 50 | 3.9% | +0.8 pts | €2.3M |

![Bar chart of airlines by share of disrupted flights in October 2026](/data/2026-10/airlines.svg)

## Which departure airports were most disrupted in October 2026?

The same ranking by airport of departure. A high rate at a hub can reflect one bad week of weather as easily as a bad airline, so read it beside the [live radar](/radar).

| Departure airport | Flights | Qualifying | Cancelled | Rate | vs September |
| --- | ---: | ---: | ---: | ---: | ---: |
| [Barcelona El Prat (BCN)](/data/airports/bcn) | 30,109 | 1,955 | 1,627 | 6.5% | +3.3 pts |
| [Santiago de Compostela (SCQ)](/data/airports/scq) | 767 | 38 | 22 | 5.0% | +0.2 pts |
| [Dubrovnik (DBV)](/data/airports/dbv) | 761 | 36 | 23 | 4.7% | +2.3 pts |
| [Ibiza (IBZ)](/data/airports/ibz) | 2,509 | 118 | 79 | 4.7% | +2.4 pts |
| [Bilbao (BIO)](/data/airports/bio) | 2,080 | 79 | 56 | 3.8% | +2.3 pts |
| [Menorca (MAH)](/data/airports/mah) | 956 | 34 | 29 | 3.6% | +1.9 pts |
| [Aberdeen (ABZ)](/data/airports/abz) | 629 | 21 | 18 | 3.3% | +0.6 pts |
| [Seville (SVQ)](/data/airports/svq) | 2,141 | 70 | 50 | 3.3% | +1.8 pts |
| [Milan (MXP)](/data/airports/mxp) | 14,563 | 474 | 302 | 3.3% | +1.1 pts |
| [Ponta Delgada (PDL)](/data/airports/pdl) | 509 | 15 | 10 | 2.9% | +1.7 pts |
| [Brussels (BRU)](/data/airports/bru) | 11,902 | 340 | 316 | 2.9% | +1.2 pts |
| [Amsterdam Schiphol (AMS)](/data/airports/ams) | 29,428 | 831 | 762 | 2.8% | +0.5 pts |

## Which countries had the most disrupted departures in October 2026?

Departures grouped by the country of the airport they left from. The panel watches some countries more closely than others, so compare rates, not totals.

| Country | Departures | Qualifying | Rate | vs September | Worst airport |
| --- | ---: | ---: | ---: | ---: | --- |
| Netherlands | 30,270 | 843 | 2.8% | +0.5 pts | AMS |
| Spain | 124,769 | 3,269 | 2.6% | +1.0 pts | BCN |
| Belgium | 13,290 | 342 | 2.6% | +0.8 pts | BRU |
| Italy | 65,800 | 1,289 | 2.0% | −0.8 pts | MXP |
| Czechia | 3,913 | 74 | 1.9% | +0.8 pts | PRG |
| Iceland | 1,224 | 22 | 1.8% | +0.4 pts | KEF |
| United Kingdom | 101,522 | 1,664 | 1.6% | −0.7 pts | ABZ |
| Croatia | 2,895 | 45 | 1.6% | +0.3 pts | DBV |
| Switzerland | 19,352 | 292 | 1.5% | +0.2 pts | GVA |
| France | 67,280 | 947 | 1.4% | +0.2 pts | LYS |
| Sweden | 6,073 | 77 | 1.3% | +0.2 pts | GOT |
| Luxembourg | 1,350 | 16 | 1.2% | +0.1 pts | LUX |

## Which routes were most disrupted in October 2026?

Routes with at least 30 observed flights, ranked by the share that reached the threshold.

| Route | Flights | Qualifying | Cancelled | Rate |
| --- | ---: | ---: | ---: | ---: |
| LHR – RUH | 179 | 79 | 79 | 44.1% |
| FCO – RUH | 49 | 17 | 17 | 34.7% |
| BCN – BOD | 87 | 23 | 23 | 26.4% |
| BCN – LHR | 398 | 100 | 98 | 25.1% |
| ATH – MLO | 166 | 40 | 40 | 24.1% |
| LYS – BCN | 54 | 12 | 10 | 22.2% |
| CDG – RUH | 50 | 11 | 10 | 22.0% |
| FCO – JED | 32 | 7 | 7 | 21.9% |
| BCN – HAJ | 37 | 8 | 8 | 21.6% |
| BIO – BCN | 297 | 63 | 42 | 21.2% |

## Which days in October 2026 were worst, and what slowed the network?

The three days with the most qualifying flights. Beside each are the airports where EUROCONTROL recorded the most air traffic flow delay to arrivals that day, with the main reason it gave. That describes the network, not the cause of any one flight.

- **Sunday 4 October 2026**: 1,140 of 25,905 flights reached the threshold, 919 of them cancelled. No EUROCONTROL arrival delay is on file for that day.
- **Saturday 3 October 2026**: 1,085 of 23,626 flights reached the threshold, 905 of them cancelled. No EUROCONTROL arrival delay is on file for that day.
- **Friday 16 October 2026**: 963 of 27,414 flights reached the threshold, 659 of them cancelled. No EUROCONTROL arrival delay is on file for that day.

The causes come from the [EUROCONTROL Aviation Intelligence Portal](https://ansperformance.eu/csv/).

## How much compensation could passengers have been owed in October 2026?

We price each qualifying flight under the law that applies to its route. The figure is a ceiling, not a bill, and not money left unclaimed: we do not know how much airlines paid.

- EU261 (Regulation 261/2004): 9,173 qualifying flights, up to €516.1M.
- UK261: 1,623 qualifying flights, up to €111.8M.
- Canada APPR: 122 qualifying flights, up to €18.2M.
- Israel Aviation Services Law: 31 qualifying flights, up to €2.1M.

## How should you read these flight disruption statistics?

Passenger flights that departed from or arrived at a monitored airport inside a passenger-rights territory (EU/EEA, UK, Switzerland and the other European states on the panel). Cargo and private flights are excluded. The panel is a sample of the network, so every figure is a floor on what happened, never an estimate of the whole market.

A flight qualifies when its verified arrival was 180 minutes or more late, or the airline cancelled it: the thresholds at which compensation under Regulation (EC) 261/2004 and its UK, Israeli and Canadian counterparts can arise. Qualifying does not mean owed: the airline may still show extraordinary circumstances. The bands come from [Regulation (EC) No 261/2004](https://eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/reg/2004/261/oj); our [EU261 guide](/passenger-rights/eu261) explains them in plain language.

Estimated compensation is a statutory ceiling: each qualifying flight's legal band (EU261/UK261 distance bands, Canada's APPR delay tiers, Israel's Aviation Services Law) multiplied by typical seats for the route distance, assuming every seat is occupied and eligible. It is the most the law could put on the airline for that flight, before individual eligibility. Flights whose route cannot be resolved count as qualifying but contribute no exposure. The [compensation calculator](/flight-delay-compensation-calculator) prices a single flight the same way.

The rules will change. The European Parliament approved a reform of EU261 on 7 July 2026, expected to apply from the second half of 2027. Until then the current rules stand.

## Why do these numbers differ from the live data page?

The [live data page](/data) recomputes on every visit and includes flights the engine is still verifying. This release counts one closed calendar month, after its flights finalised. Quote the release when you need a figure that will still be true next year; use the live page for what is happening this week.

## How can journalists cite the October 2026 release?

Quote any figure freely. Attribute it to FlightCompensations, link to https://flightcompensations.com/data/2026-10, and name the month. A citation can read: "FlightCompensations, Flight disruption statistics, October 2026, https://flightcompensations.com/data/2026-10".

- Data: [CSV](/data/2026-10.csv) for a spreadsheet, [JSON](/data/2026-10.json) for code, [Markdown](/data/2026-10.md) for text.
- Charts: SVG files you may republish with their source line, the [daily chart](/data/2026-10/daily.svg) and the [airline chart](/data/2026-10/airlines.svg).
- Spokesperson: Jaacov Sonenblick, available for comment.
- Press contact: support@flightcompensations.com. We also run cuts we do not publish, such as one route over a year.

If your own flight was among the disrupted ones, the [flight check](/claim) reads that one record instead of the aggregate.

## Frequently asked questions

### Where does the October 2026 flight disruption data come from?

From our own monitoring of scheduled and actual flight times at 160 airports, not from a regulator's release. We record what happened to every passenger flight through the panel and count the ones that reached a compensation threshold. The panel is a sample, so the totals are a floor on the month, never a market estimate.

### Will the October 2026 figures change later?

Only by a published correction. The month was aggregated after it closed and its flights had finalised, and the result was written once. If we find an error in how we counted, we re-issue the month and list the change, with the old figures, on the release itself.

### Can I quote these statistics in an article or a report?

Yes, free of charge. Name FlightCompensations as the source, link to this release, and state the month beside the figure. For a cut we do not publish, such as one route or one airline over several months, write to support@flightcompensations.com and we will run it from the same records.

## Sources

- Regulation (EC) No 261/2004: https://eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/reg/2004/261/oj
- EUROCONTROL Aviation Intelligence Portal, airport arrival ATFM delay data: https://ansperformance.eu/csv/

Read the full page at https://flightcompensations.com/data/2026-10