Irish airline Ryanair has announced it will drop flights from seven Spanish airports in summer 2025, blaming what it says are overly high aviation levies applied by state-controlled airport operator Aena.
It is not the first time the so-called budget carrier has denounced “excessive fees” and it has long threatened to cut its schedules at various destinations as a result. In 2023, it said it would reduce operations in Portugal for the same reason, at the Azores, Faro and Porto. At the time, in typical no-holds-barred language, Ryanair said that Portuguese tourism businesses would lose out due to state greed.
And in 2024, it cut flights to Ben Gurion in Tel Aviv, when the Israeli airport closed its low-cost terminal amid the Israel-Hamas war.
800,000 passenger seats lost
Now, the harp-liveried airline has said the lack of “viable incentives” has pushed it to cease operations altogether in Jerez in southern Spain’s Andalusia as well as in Castile and Léon’s Valladolid. It is also to slash the number of flights on routes on routes up and down the country to Vigo, Santiago de Compostela, Zaragoza, Santander and Asturias.
The move means that Spain will lose flights from what is its biggest national airline in terms of passengers. Capacity on 12 routes will shrink by 18%, meaning the loss of 800,000 passenger seats, the carrier pointed out in a statement. Instead, that capacity will be deployed in Croatia, Hungary, Italy, Morocco, Sweden and countries where, Ryanair’s statement said, “governments encourage growth.”

“Spurious arguments”
If the airline’s remarks are an attempt to coax Spain’s government into lowering the fees, it’s worth noting that the southern European nation is in the midst of an overtourism crisis that has led to a series of anti-tourism protests and, in some cities, bans of short-term holiday rentals. In that context, not all Spanish citizens will be sorry even if tourist numbers are seen to fall.
However, Aena has responded in kind, highlighting that, in fact, Ryanair data shows capacity is up for 2025’s summer season, following an 8.7% increase last year. What’s more, Reuters reports, the Spanish agency’s fees have been frozen since the Covid-19 pandemic and, at €10.35 per passenger, are among the lowest aviation levies in Europe.
In its clapback, Aena accused Ryanair of making “spurious arguments” which, it said, were designed “to confuse citizens and put pressure on public institutions”.