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Reliable Data, Smarter Forecasts, and Real Results:

How Edinburgh Airport Uses Schedules Analyser

Edinburgh Airport's Story

Edinburgh Airport, serving 16 million passengers per year, is Scotland’s global gateway connecting travelers to more than 150 destinations across Europe, North America, the Middle East, and beyond. 

With a strong mix of full-service, charter, and low-cost carriers, the airport has grown across many key traffic segments, catering for both leisure and business travel. Its commitment to sustainability, traveler experience, and operational excellence supports its vision to make travel to and from Scotland as accessible and efficient as possible.

Edinburgh’s growth ambitions rely on a critical component, a data-driven approach to win and sustain new routes. 

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The Challenge

Detailed and Accurate Data

Edinburgh Airport’s Aviation Team is at the heart of the airport’s growth strategy, responsible for developing new and existing route opportunities that strengthen Scotland’s global connectivity.

As part of their strategy, the team needs to build detailed and accurate business cases to support network expansion, often including long-haul and transatlantic services.

 

Accurate Data

Forecasting is also particularly important in Edinburgh Airport’s approach to long-haul route development. Accurate data allows the team to simulate passenger flows and assess connectivity through various global hubs.

These insights are then used to build projections of route performance, which are shared with airlines as part of their network evaluation process.

Schedule Data

To achieve their strategic development and forecasting goals, the team requires fast, accurate, and flexible schedule data that can be applied to internal forecasting models and shared with airline partners.

The data must be reliable, current, and accessible in a versatile format suitable for a range of audiences. For wider adoption across the business, the platform also needed to be intuitive, user-friendly, and sophisticated enough for any team member to use confidently.

The Solution

Partnering on Innovation

After many years of success using Schedules Analyser, Edinburgh Airport became a Development Partner with OAG for the New Schedules Analyser platform. This builds on their long-standing reliance on OAG data to drive growth, while also giving them early access to next-generation tools and the opportunity to help shape the platform’s development.

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As long-time users of Schedules Analyser, becoming an OAG Development Partner for the new platform was a natural next step. It’s given us early access to powerful features and a chance to collaborate on shaping a tool we already use every day.

Will Green, Aviation Team, Edinburgh Airport
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The New Schedules Analyser is powerful, intuitive, and delivers the functionality we need today and the flexibility to support our future growth, making it a vital tool across the organization.

Will Green, Aviation Team, Edinburgh Airport

New Schedules Analyser

Powered by METIS, OAG’s cloud platform, New Schedules Analyser provides the comprehensive and customizable Capacity Report, offering powerful insights into the global aviation landscape via a sleek and accessible design. Versatile and flexible, New Schedules Analyser allows for additional chart types including pie charts, line charts, bar charts, and multi-line bar charts, enabling teams to access downloadable, valuable insights in the format that they need. 

POWERING ROUTE DEVELOPMENT AND PLANNING

Used daily across Edinburgh Airport’s Route Development and Operational Planning teams, Classic Schedules Analyser delivers the data needed to develop accurate and credible business cases for new services, monitor airline performance, and identify market shifts early.

Learn more about Schedules Analyser

UNLOCKING INSIGHTS FOR GROWTH

The route development team uses Schedules Analyser to extract data on on-sale capacity, aircraft types, and frequencies, and to monitor how schedules evolve week by week. The Capacity Report is the most frequently used feature, providing insight into changes in fleet deployment or flight frequency that may signal route expansion or reduction. This helps the team quickly identify opportunities and assess how Edinburgh fits into an airline’s broader network strategy.

SPOTTING TRENDS WITH SNAPSHOTS

A core feature used is the Snapshot function, which allows teams to compare what was on sale at different points in time. Snapshots are especially useful for spotting trends in airline scheduling behavior, including how far in advance certain carriers load or adjust their schedules. These patterns are factored into Edinburgh Airport’s internal forecasting and budget planning processes, helping to inform when and how to engage airline partners.

STREAMLINING REPORTING ACROSS TEAMS

The team also integrates Schedules data into dashboards to automate the tracking and analysis of key routes. Once downloaded, the data can be manipulated easily to fit into Edinburgh Airport’s internal reporting formats. Thanks to its simplicity of use, Analyser has been successfully rolled out across departments.

SUPPORTING CAPACITY PLANNING

Beyond the route development team, Edinburgh Airport’s Capacity Planning team also uses Schedules Analyser to cross-check slot filings against actual on-sale schedules. This is especially important for ensuring that planned capacity aligns with what airlines are offering, improving operational forecasting and resource planning at the airport.

Learn more about Schedules Analyser

Edinburgh Airport's Results

<h3>Forecasting Accuracy Delivers Record Transatlantic Growth</h3>

Forecasting Accuracy Delivers Record Transatlantic Growth

Since embedding Schedules Analyser into its forecasting processes, Edinburgh Airport has improved forecasting accuracy and operational efficiency, particularly for long-haul route launches.

Recent transatlantic services closely matched pre-launch forecasts, reinforcing Edinburgh Airport’s credibility with airline partners.

Building on this success, its transatlantic network has grown rapidly, with 2025 seats on sale up 122% vs. 2019 and more than 1 million two-way direct seats now offered annually to the USA and Canada.

 

<h3>Streamlined Workflows Through Current Data</h3>

Streamlined Workflows Through Current Data

The ability to access and analyze current schedule data daily has significantly improved Edinburgh Airport’s workflow.

By removing the need to manually collect data from multiple sources, the team can dedicate more time to analysis and insight generation.

This shift has led to faster turnaround times for business cases and better-informed decision-making across the team.

<h3>Smarter, Faster Decision-Making</h3>

Smarter, Faster Decision-Making

Internally, Edinburgh Airport uses Schedules Analyser to support both strategic planning and day-to-day monitoring.

The team uses it weekly to review changes in available capacity and airline behavior, and daily to support business case development, meeting preparation, and internal reporting.

 

<h3>Market-Leading Growth</h3>

Market-Leading Growth

These operational improvements have underpinned Edinburgh Airport’s impressive performance in recent years.

The airport is now one of the fastest-growing in the UK, with international capacity in 2025 up 35% versus 2019 - the largest increase of any UK airport with more than one million annual passengers.

Specific long-haul services have also flourished. One such route, launched in 2023 as a limited summer operation, has rapidly expanded in just two years to cover most of the summer season, with seats on the route rising by 119% since launch.

<h3>Building a Data-Led Development Toolkit</h3>

Building a Data-Led Development Toolkit

Schedules Data has become an essential part of Edinburgh Airport’s route development toolkit.

Every new route proposal includes data from Schedules Analyser as part of the broader business case. This supports Edinburgh Airport’s efforts to present grounded, data-led proposals that align with each airline’s strategic goals.

 

What's Next for Edinburgh Airport

Growth Strategy

Building on this foundation, Edinburgh Airport’s role as an OAG Development Partner ensures it can continue to evolve alongside the New Schedules Analyser platform.

Having proven the value of Schedules Data for forecasting and route development, Edinburgh Airport is now helping shape the future of the tool - ensuring it remains central to its growth strategy.

Monitor Industry Trends

The team also plans to continue using the New Schedules Analyser to monitor industry trends and respond to changes in airline behavior across global markets.

The ability to compare schedules remains critical as airlines continue to adjust their networks to post-pandemic and into future growth phases.

Indentify Opportunities

With OAG’s New Schedules Analyser in place, Edinburgh Airport is well positioned to identify new opportunities, support airline decision-making, and continue growing Edinburgh’s role as a key international hub.

From Edinburgh Airport

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Our focus is always on using data to demonstrate why Edinburgh Airport is such an attractive destination and proposition - and it's something airlines agree with. The data provided by OAG is extremely accurate and is so up to date that we can see what’s happening week to week in the market. The Schedules Analyser tool also complements work across the business, ensuring various teams can quickly access the data they need.

Will Green, Airline Executive, Aviation Team, Edinburgh Airport

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