| Penang International Airport | |
| Iata: | PEN |
| Icao: | WMKP |
| Wmo: | 48601 |
| Type: | Public |
| Owner-Oper: | Malaysia Airports |
| City-Served: | George Town Conurbation |
| Location: | Bayan Lepas, George Town, Penang, Malaysia |
| Timezone: | MST |
| Elevation-F: | 11 |
| Metric-Elev: | yes |
| Coordinates: | 5.2971°N 100.2769°W |
| Pushpin Map: | Malaysia Penang George Town city centre#Malaysia West#Malaysia#Southeast Asia |
| Pushpin Map Caption: | Location in George Town##Location in West Malaysia##Location in Malaysia##Location in Southeast Asia |
| Pushpin Label: | PEN/WMKP |
| R1-Number: | 04/22 |
| R1-Length-M: | 3,354 |
| R1-Surface: | Asphalt |
| Metric-Rwy: | yes |
| Stat1-Header: | Passenger |
| Stat1-Data: | 6,789,712 (58.6%) |
| Stat-Year: | 2023 |
| Stat2-Header: | Airfreight (tonnes) |
| Stat2-Data: | 119,919 (26.0%) |
| Stat3-Header: | Aircraft movements |
| Stat3-Data: | 62,145 (26.7%) |
Penang International Airport (PIA) is an international airport in George Town, the capital city of the Malaysian state of Penang. The airport is located at the southeastern tip of Penang Island, 16km (10miles) south of the city centre, and serves the country's second largest conurbation.[1]
As the main gateway into northwestern Malaysia, PIA is the third busiest airport in Malaysia in terms of passenger traffic, recording nearly 6.8 million tourist arrivals in 2023 alone. It is also the second busiest in the country by cargo handled and the highest in terms of export value, with RM365 billion in exports in 2023. Additionally, the airport is the main hub for local budget airline Firefly and one of AirAsia's operating bases.[2]
The airport, then named Bayan Lepas International Airport, was completed in 1935, when Penang was part of the British crown colony of the Straits Settlements.[3]
In the 1970s, a major expansion of the airport was carried out, during which a terminal building of Minangkabau architecture was built and the runway extended to accommodate Boeing 747s, then the largest passenger jet aircraft. Upon the completion of the expansion works in 1979, the airport was renamed Penang International Airport.
The airport became a source of contention between the Penang state government and the federal government in the 2010s, as transportation infrastructure throughout Malaysia falls under the purview of the latter. Calls by the Penang state government to expand PIA largely went unheeded, even though the airport has exceeded its maximum capacity of 6.5 million passengers.[4] It was not until 2017 when the federal authorities finally announced plans to expand PIA to accommodate 12 million passengers per year by 2029.[5] [6]
While the planned expansion met with delays due to the COVID-19 pandemic, in 2023, the federal Ministry of Transport approved an allocation of RM93 million to facilitate land acquisition and infrastructure development for the airport's expansion.[7]
This flight operates with a stop at Phuket. However, the airline has no traffic rights to transport passengers solely between Penang and Phuket.
PIA is the third busiest airport in the country in terms of passenger traffic after Kuala Lumpur International Airport (KLIA) and Kota Kinabalu International Airport (KKIA).[8] The airport experienced its peak passenger traffic of 8.3 million in 2019, surpassing its annual capacity of 6.5 million passengers, before the outbreak of COVID-19 caused global disruptions in air travel.[9] In 2023, PIA recorded nearly 6.8 million passengers, compared to 4.275 million in 2022.[10]
The PIAKLIA route is one of the busiest air corridors in Malaysia, having flown 2.2 million passengers in 2019. Additionally, the PIAChangi corridor is estimated to be the third busiest among Malaysia's ASEAN routes, with around 300,000 passengers flown throughout 2022.[11]
While it processes the second largest cargo tonnage after KLIA, in terms of export value, PIA's is the highest of all Malaysian airports, with RM365 billion worth of exports passing through PIA in 2023 alone.[12]
| Passengers handled | Passenger % change | Cargo (tonnes) | Cargo % change | Aircraft movements | Aircraft % change | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2003 | 2,334,669 | 197,567 | 30,558 | ||||
| 2004 | 2,987,993 | 28.0 | 212,369 | 7.5 | 33,069 | 8.2 | |
| 2005 | 2,834,545 | 5.1 | 221,971 | 4.5 | 34,616 | 4.7 | |
| 2006 | 3,103,772 | 9.5 | 225,952 | 1.8 | 36,259 | 4.7 | |
| 2007 | 3,173,117 | 2.2 | 208,582 | 7.7 | 39,265 | 8.3 | |
| 2008 | 3,405,762 | 7.3 | 192,936 | 7.5 | 43,796 | 11.5 | |
| 2009 | 3,325,423 | 2.4 | 137,775 | 28.6 | 43,621 | 0.4 | |
| 2010 | 4,166,969 | 25.3 | 147,057 | 6.7 | 50,205 | 15.1 | |
| 2011 | 4,600,274 | 10.4 | 131,846 | 10.3 | 54,713 | 9.0 | |
| 2012 | 4,767,815 | 3.6 | 123,246 | 6.5 | 53,766 | 1.7 | |
| 2013 | 5,487,751 | 15.1 | 153,703 | 24.7 | 60,020 | 11.6 | |
| 2014 | 6,041,583 | 10.1 | 141,213 | 8.1 | 65,734 | 9.5 | |
| 2015 | 6,258,756 | 3.6 | 130,392 | 7.7 | 66,670 | 1.4 | |
| 2016 | 6,684,026 | 6.8 | 130,491 | 0.1 | 66,247 | 0.6 | |
| 2017 | 7,232,097 | 8.2 | 134,187 | 2.8 | 70,609 | 6.6 | |
| 2018 | 7,790,423 | 7.7 | 145,649 | 8.5 | 75,552 | 7.0 | |
| 2019 | 8,331,291 | 6.9 | 139,646 | 4.1 | 80,598 | 6.7 | |
| 2020 | 1,826,121 | 78.1 | 137,685 | 1.4 | 30,433 | 62.2 | |
| 2021 | 542,681 | 70.3 | 153,782 | 11.7 | 17,452 | 42.7 | |
| 2022 | 4,275,791 | 687.9 | 162,048 | 5.4 | 49,036 | 181.0 | |
| 2023 | 6,789,712 | 58.6 | 119,919 | 26.0 | 62,145 | 26.7 | |
| Source: Malaysia Airports Holdings Berhad,[13] Ministry of Transport | |||||||
| Nationality | Arrivals | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2017 | 2016 | 2015 | 2014 | 2013 | ||
| 279,173 | 238,056 | 268,892 | 286,896 | 232,423 | ||
| 68,341 | 56,116 | 62,215 | 61,095 | 43,934 | ||
| 67,774 | 135,107 | 144,581 | 144,368 | 110,323 | ||
| 26,610 | 12,951 | 22,087 | 20,712 | 18,337 | ||
| 24,346 | 21,916 | 27,682 | 30,927 | 26,325 | ||
| 22,346 | 14,482 | 17,687 | 19,590 | 17,685 | ||
| 19,539 | 18,326 | 22,488 | 20,960 | 19,218 | ||
| 16,082 | 15,871 | 22,033 | 22,423 | 22,664 | ||
| 15,541 | 15,708 | 18,850 | 18,660 | 16,946 | ||
| 7,155 | 6,954 | 7,534 | 8,757 | 7,871 | ||
| Source: Immigration Department of Malaysia[14] | ||||||
Rapid Penang has provided four bus routes to and from Penang International Airport, connecting the airport with various parts of George Town.[15]