Global business jet activity rose 1.5% year-on-year in Week 25 (15–21 June), according to WingX data, with the year-to-date figure through 21 June running 3.9% ahead of the same period last year; a notable improvement on the 2025 versus 2024 trend across comparable dates.

The opening days of the 2026 FIFA World Cup (11–22 June) produced a clear but variable boost to business jet traffic across the 16 host cities. Measuring movements within each market's match window (the day before, day of and day after each fixture) against a typical day, the sharpest surges were recorded at smaller markets rather than major hubs. Seattle roughly doubled its normal daily activity for the USA vs Australia match on 19 June, while Mexico City ran at approximately 1.7x throughput across the tournament opener, including a heavy departure wave the day after the crowd cleared Estadio Azteca.

North America expanded 3.5% in Week 25 and is up 5.0% year-to-date through 21 June. The US market performed slightly ahead of the regional figure, rising 3.7% compared to Week 25 2025 and 5.2% year-to-date. At state level, Florida grew 3.9%, Texas 3.2% and California 2.3%.

European activity contracted 1.7% in Week 25, though growth trends varied by country. Germany posted the strongest regional performance at 10.4% year-on-year growth, with the UK recording a 2.2% gain. France declined 3.9%, Italy fell 5.9% and Switzerland saw a double-digit contraction of 14.4%.

Outside Europe and North America, aggregate Rest of World activity continued to be weighed down by the Middle East conflict. The region as a whole declined 3.1% in Week 25 year-on-year. South America was the lone Rest of World region to post a Week 25 gain, up 9.2%, while Africa declined a marginal 0.5%. Asia contracted 2.8% and the Middle East fell 21.9%, leaving the region more than 20% below year-to-date 2025 levels.

“As expected, the World Cup is bringing in a surge of business jet traffic to nearby airports of the host cities,” says WingX analyst Nick Koscinski. “The smaller markets are seeing a much more sizeable surge in traffic, whereas large metros like New York or LA see the extra jets just blend into an already busy month. With the knockout rounds still to come, we expect to start to see bigger spikes to follow, with the final match delivering the largest surge of them all.”