While European business aviation activity currently accounts for around 15% of total global usage, the continent’s post-Covid recovery has nevertheless been significantly slower than that experienced elsewhere. Speaking at the British Business and General Aviation Association conference on March 12, WingX CEO Richard Koe revealed that a total of 567,842 European departures in 2025 were underpinned by shifting regional usage, an uptick in larger aircraft types, and the sharp decline of the corporate flight department.
Although it is resilient enough to recover, European business aviation has notably lagged the post-pandemic growth seen in the U.S. In 2025, European activity was up 10% since 2019, a sluggish comparison to the U.S.’s growth of 31%. This, believes Koe, can partly be attributed to a “disappointing” weak European compound annual growth rate: just 2.1% in 2025 versus 1.9% pre-Covid. “This is barely an upwards shift, whereas in the U.S., it’s double,” he explained.
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