Cochin International Airport

Cochin International is the principal international gateway to Kerala — India's southwesternmost state and the departure and return airport for a very large share of the roughly 2.5M Keralite expatriate workers employed in the Gulf. That Gulf migration explains the shape of the airport's international network and more than half of its passenger traffic: COK typically operates the highest proportion of Gulf-bound passengers of any major Indian airport. The airport also anchors tourism for Kochi, the Backwaters, Munnar, Thekkady, and the hill-station resorts of central Kerala. COK is most distinctive for being the world's first fully solar-powered airport: a 40 MW solar installation completed in phases from 2015 makes the airport operationally net-positive in electricity generation, a status that has earned it the UN Champions of the Earth award. A single 3,400 m (11,155 ft) runway, three terminals (T1 international, T2 international long-haul, T3 domestic), and a separate private aviation terminal handle approximately 72 routes to 33 destinations via 25 airlines. Air India Express maintains one of its largest hubs here; IndiGo, Air India, SpiceJet, Emirates, Qatar Airways, Saudia, Etihad, FlyDubai, Gulf Air, Oman Air, Kuwait Airways, Salam Air, Singapore Airlines, Thai AirAsia, AirAsia, and Sri Lankan all operate. The airport was Asia's first public-private partnership greenfield airport when it opened in 1999, and remains majority-owned by non-resident Keralite investors alongside the Kerala state government. It has been Kerala's busiest airport since overtaking Thiruvananthapuram in 2015 and handled approximately 10M passengers in 2023. A major T2 terminal expansion raised international capacity to support long-haul widebody demand to Europe, the Gulf, and Southeast Asia.