11.3 million arrivals to Malaga airport between January and August 2016

Malaga airport registered a total of 11.3 million passengers between January and August this year, a rise of 1.5 million people compared to the same period in 2015. While the Costa del Sol has always attracted large numbers of visitors over June, July and particularly August, new figures released by Aena show this summer was one of the busiest ones yet, surpassing last year's record breaking numbers.

Over 2 million passengers arrived in Malaga airport over the month of August, an increase of 12.4 per cent on last year. The number of flights are also registered to have risen, with 8,739 more flights in the first 8 months of the year, a rise of 11.7 per cent. Of those flights, 14,987 aircrafts were processed in August alone - 506 of which landed or took off on the 20th of August. The largest number of passengers however arrived on the 6th of August, with a total of 69,784 registered travellers.

In August, 1,689,400 travelled back to a foreign city, an increase of 13.6 per cent, while 255,527 travellers returned to a national destination, a rise of 3.9 per cent. Of those, 676,690 travelled back to the United Kingdom.

The promising figures further illustrate how much the tourism sector in the southern Spanish region is flourishing, continuing to aid recovering and growing sectors in Andalucia and reinstating the Costa del Sol as one of the most popular holidays destinations in the world.