Dubai International Airport is the world’s busiest, with passenger counts exceeding projections in 2021, while the airport’s chief executive told Bloomberg that traffic may not return to pre-pandemic levels until 2024.

In 2021, the airport handled 29.1 million passengers, beating expectations by more than half a million, according to Dubai Airports.

According to current projections, passenger volume at the airport might nearly quadruple by 2022, reaching 55.1 million.

However, demand is still far lower than in 2019, when 86.4 million passengers went through the airport.

According to Bloomberg, Dubai Airports CEO Paul Griffiths believes it will take 18 months beyond the end of the year to achieve 2019 levels.

The strong booking trends, particularly “quite encouraging” summer bookings, suggest that Dubai Airports’ predictions are “a little bit conservative,” according to Griffiths.

In a statement, the CEO attributed the increase in passenger numbers in part to Dubai Airport’s return to full capacity in November.

He also mentioned that the Dubai Airshow 2021 and Expo 2020 Dubai would be big draws for international visitors.

He also mentioned a new in-house airport laboratory for processing COVID-19 PCR test samples quickly.

According to the announcement, Dubai will be served by a record number of new airlines in 2021.

With 4.2 million individuals coming to the south Asian country in 2021, India remained the top destination for Dubai passengers by volume.

Pakistan came in second with 1.8 million visitors, Saudi Arabia came in third with 1.5 million, and the United Kingdom came in fourth with 1.2 million.

Istanbul, with 916,000 passengers, Cairo, with 905,000, and London, with 814,000, were the leading city destinations.

DXB is now connected to 198 destinations in 93 countries via 84 international carriers, which is up from 198 destinations in 2019 before the pandemic.