Ryanair announces the end of flights to Azores in April

Ryanair has announced that is ending flights to the Azores from March 29, 2026.

The airline has justified the decision on “high airport taxes” that have been defined by “the high airport taxes” charged by the French-owned Portuguese airports management company ANA and at the “inaction of the Portuguese government”.

The Azores will lose six routes carrying 400,000 passengers a year says the low cost airline.

“Unfortunately, the ANA monopoly does not have any kind of plan to increase low-cost connectivity with the Azores”,complains the airline.

“ANA faces no competition in Portugal, which has allowed it to make monopolistic profits by raising Portuguese airport charges without any penalty, at a time when competing airports in other EU countries are cutting charges to stimulate growth,” it added in a statement.

Therefore, it calls for the intervention of the Portuguese Government, “which increased air navigation fees by +120% after Covid and introduced a travel fee of two euros” and accuses it of doing nothing. “It must intervene and ensure that its airports serve to benefit the Portuguese people and not a French airport monopoly,” Ryanair says.

The airline also complains about the EU’s uncompetitive environment taxes that are affecting the competitiveness of the remoter regions like the Azores.

The Irish airline was specifically referring to the EU’s Emissions Trading System (ETS) that applies only to intra-European flights “while long-haul flights, which are more polluting, to the US and Middle East are excluded”.

“Instead of making European aviation more competitive (reducing ETS), the EU has expanded the ETS to cover remote regions like the Azores – exempting non-EU competitors like Turkey and Morocco”, states Ryanair.

“We are disappointed with the French airports monopoly ANA which continues to increase Portuguese airport taxes to fill their pockets at the cost of tourism and employment in Portugal – particularly the Portuguese islands.

“Increasing costs left us with no alternative but to cancel flights to the Azores from 29 March, 2026 and relocate this capacity to lower cost airports in other parts of the vast network of the Ryanair Group in Europe”, said the airlines’ commercial director, Jason McGuinness.