South Korea's Incheon airport (the country's main international gateway, located roughly 48km west of Seoul) handled 38.39 million international passengers in the first half of 2026, making it the busiest airport in the world for international traffic for the first time since it opened in 2001. London's Heathrow came second with 37.79 million, followed by Singapore's Changi with 34.53 million, according to preliminary figures from the Airports Council International. Officials attributed the shift in part to the ongoing US-Iran conflict, which has disrupted major Middle Eastern hubs such as Dubai and redirected transfer traffic through east Asian alternatives, while a surge in visitors from China and Japan also boosted Incheon's numbers.