Lisbon, Sept. 8, 2026 (Lusa) - The number of passengers using public transport increased year on year across all modes in the second quarter, except for the metro, which fell for the third consecutive quarter, Statistics Portugal (INE) announced on Tuesday.
As regards freight, road and rail transport recorded lower activity.
According to the INE's transport activity statistics, 73.0 million passengers travelled by metro between April and June, representing a year-on-year drop of 1.0%, following a 2.2% fall in the previous quarter.
Over the same period, rail transport carried 62.9 million passengers, up 6.2% (up 0.8% in the first quarter).
Meanwhile, domestic airports handled 20.8 million passengers during the period, a year-on-year increase of 1.5% (+3.9% in the previous quarter), whilst river transport totalled 6.2 million passengers, up 0.4% (-3.2% in the first quarter).
The Lisbon Metro carried 42.4 million passengers, down 4.4% from the same period in 2025 (-4.0% in the first quarter), while the Porto Metro carried 25.4 million passengers, up 4.8% (+0.8%). Meanwhile, Metro Sul do Tejo carried 5.2 million passengers, up 1.3% (0.6% lower in the previous quarter).
From April to June, the utilisation rate for all metro systems stood at 23.1%, down 0.5 percentage points on the same period in 2025 and up 0.7 percentage points on the previous quarter.
The Porto Metro recorded the highest utilisation rate (23.8%), followed by the Lisbon Metro (23.3%) and the Metro Sul do Tejo (15.3%).
Rail transport carried 51.5 million passengers, accounting for 81.9% of the total, and recorded year-on-year growth of 4.4% (0.3% in the first quarter of 2026).
Intercity traffic totalled 11.3 million passengers, continuing the growth trend seen in previous quarters (+15.6%, +6.9% in the first quarter of 2026), whilst international traffic totalled 24,000, continuing the downward trend, with a year-on-year decrease of 7.0% (–15.8% in the first quarter).
As for air transport, Lisbon Airport accounted for 46.0% of total passenger numbers, with 9.6 million, down 0.2% compared with the same period in 2025 (+3.1% in the first quarter of 2026).
Porto Airport handled around 5 million passengers, up 6.1% year-on-year (+8.3% in the previous quarter), while Faro Airport recorded 3.5 million, up 4.3%.
Meanwhile, Madeira Airport handled 1.5 million passengers (+2.4% year-on-year), whilst Ponta Delgada Airport handled 704,500, a 12.9% year-on-year adjustment compared with the second quarter of 2025.
From April to June, international air traffic totalled 17.3 million passengers, a year-on-year increase of 2.7 per cent and accounting for 83.2 per cent of total passenger traffic.
The proportion of international traffic was highest at Faro airport (95.1 per cent), followed by Lisbon (89.3 per cent) and Porto (87.9 per cent).
As for waterway transport, operators carried 5.4 million passengers on the River Tagus, up 1.8% from the same period in 2025 (3.0% down in the first quarter of 2026).
In freight transport, road transport fell by 3.6%, totalling 27.7 million tonnes (a 12.6% decline from the previous quarter), while national seaports handled 22.7 million tonnes, up 5.0% year-on-year, following a 6.5% decline in the first quarter.
Meanwhile, rail freight transport handled 2.1 million tonnes, a year-on-year drop of 2.2% (down 1.9% in the first quarter); transport by pipeline reached 807,800 tonnes, a year-on-year increase of 3.4% (up 5.0% from 1 January 2026 to 31 March 2026), and gas transport via pipeline increased both in terms of inflows (+14.3 %) and outflows (+15.0 %), following rises of 11.0 % and 11.7 %, respectively, in the first quarter.
PD/ADB // ADB.
Lusa
