8月1日，国际航空运输协会(IATA，以下简称“国际航协”)发布2018年运输业统计报告显示，2018年全球航空连通更加便捷、高效。国际航协理事长兼首席执行官亚历山大?德?朱尼亚克表示，从2020年起，国际航协将限定净排放量，以便实现碳中和增长；到2050年，将净碳排放量减少到2005年水平的一半。可持续航空燃料、新技术和更高效的航线是实现这一目标的关键所在。
2018年全球航空业亮点数据包括，2018年，全球总计44亿人次旅客搭乘飞机出行；上座率高达81.9%；与2010年相比，燃油效率提高了12%以上；目前，共有2.2万对城市开通直飞航班，比2017年增加了1300对，是1998年的两倍；在过去20年间，航空运输实际成本降低了一半以上。
客运方面，全球航空公司定期航班总计运送旅客达44亿人次，同比增6.9%，新增旅客2.84亿人次；低成本航空公司(LCC)的发展继续超过网络型航空公司；在运力方面，低成本航空公司运力增长13.4%，几乎是全行业增长率(6.9%)的两倍，低成本航空公司运力占2018年全球运力的21%，商业模式仍以短途运输为主；在国际航协290家现有成员航空公司中，有52家将自己定义为低成本航空公司和其他新型航空公司。
亚太地区航空公司再次位列客运量榜首，2018年总计运送旅客达16亿人次，同比增长9.2%，欧洲地区、北美地区紧随其后。
定期航班旅客总飞行公里数排名前五位的航空公司仍以美国四大航空公司为主，分别为美国航空公司(3306亿公里)、达美航空(3300亿公里)、美国联合航空(3296亿公里)、美国西南航空(2146亿公里)，前五中仅非美航空公司仅有阿联酋航空(3023亿公里)，排名第四。
排名前五位的国内客运航线(机场对)全部是亚太地区航线，国内黄金航线——北京首都国际机场-上海虹桥机场(年640万人次)位列第五位，前四分别为，济州岛-首尔金浦机场(年1450万人次)、福冈-东京羽田机场(年760万人次)、墨尔本-塔拉梅林-悉尼机场(年760万人次)、札幌-东京羽田机场(年730万人次)。
国际航线排名前五位的旅客国籍分布情况，英国、美国和中国以1.262亿人次、1.115亿人次和9700万人次排名前三，德国和法国紧随其后。
2018年全球航空货运需求增长3.4%，运力增长5.2%，载货率下降0.8个百分点，达到49.3%。定期航空货运吨公里排名前五位的航空公司分别为联邦快递、阿联酋航空、卡塔尔航航空、联合包裹服务公司和国泰航空。
On August 1, the International Air Transport Association (IATA) issued a transport statistics report for 2018, which shows that the global aviation connectivity in 2018 is more convenient and efficient. Alexander de juniak, chairman and chief executive of iaa, said that from 2020, IAA would limit net emissions to achieve carbon neutralization and growth, and reduce net carbon emissions to half of 2005 levels by 2050. Sustainable aviation fuels, new technologies and more efficient routes are key to achieving this goal.
The highlights of the global aviation industry in 2018 include: in 2018, 4.4 billion passengers travelled by air; the attendance rate reached 81.9%; compared with 2010, the fuel efficiency increased by more than 12%; at present, there are 22,000 direct flights in cities, an increase of 1,300 pairs compared with 2017, twice the number in 1998; The actual cost of air transport has been reduced by more than half.
In terms of passenger transport, the total number of passengers transported by scheduled flights of global airlines reached 4.4 billion, an increase of 6.9% year on year, and 284 million new passengers. The development of low-cost airlines (LCC) continued to exceed that of network airlines. In terms of transport capacity, low-cost airlines grew by 13.4%, almost twice the growth rate of the whole industry (6.9%). Low-cost Airlines account for 21% of global capacity in 2018. Short-haul is still the dominant business model. Of the 290 existing IATA member airlines, 52 define themselves as low-cost airlines and other new airlines.
Airlines in the Asia-Pacific region again ranked first in passenger traffic, with a total of 1.6 billion passengers transported in 2018, an increase of 9.2% year on year, followed by Europe and North America.
The top five airlines in the total number of passenger kilometres on scheduled flights are still mainly American Airlines (330.6 billion kilometres), Delta Airlines (330 billion kilometres), United Airlines (329.6 billion kilometres) and Southwest Airlines (214.6 billion kilometres). Only the United Arab Emirates is the top five non-American airlines. Aviation (3.23 billion kilometers) ranked fourth.
The top five domestic passenger routes (airport pairs) are all Asia-Pacific routes. The gold domestic routes - Beijing Capital International Airport - Shanghai Hongqiao Airport (6.4 million passengers per year) rank fifth. The top four are Jeju Island-Seoul Jinpu Airport (14.5 million passengers per year), Fukuoka-Tokyo Haneda Airport (7.6 million passengers per year) and Mel. Ben-Taramelin-Sydney Airport (7.6 million person-times per year) and Sapporo-Tokyo Haneda Airport (7.3 million person-times per year).
Britain, the United States and China ranked third with 126.2 million passengers, 111.5 million passengers and 97 million passengers, followed by Germany and France.
In 2018, global air cargo demand increased by 3.4%, transportation capacity increased by 5.2%, and cargo loading rate decreased by 0.8 percentage points to 49.3%. FedEx, UAE, Qatar, United Parcel Service and Cathay Pacific ranked the top five airlines in terms of regular air cargo tonnage kilometers.
