Global air cargo volumes rose 9% in September, with Asia and North America accounting for the bulk of the increase, according to industry tracking data reported by Cargo Airports & Airline Services.

The single-month figure extends a run of expansion in air freight that has stretched across 2024, as capacity tightens and yields hold firm on major east-west trade lanes.

What drove the September increase?

The reported data attributes the 9% growth overwhelmingly to two regions: Asia and North America. Asia has anchored air cargo growth all year, propelled by e-commerce out of southern China and Southeast Asia, plus recovering electronics and semiconductor shipments.

North America has added demand on the transpacific lane, the industry's busiest long-haul cargo corridor. Carriers on that routing, including FedEx, UPS, Atlas Air, Kalitta Air and the freighter arms of Cathay Pacific, China Southern and Korea Air, have benefited from sustained load factors and firm spot rates for much of the year.

A 9% year-on-year volume rise sits well above the sector's long-term growth trend, which IATA has historically pegged in the low single digits. Single-month data can be volatile — a function of holiday-season timing, charter surges and floating capacity — but September's figure points to demand that remains structurally stronger than the belly-capacity recovery alone can absorb.

What does this mean for capacity?

Sustained growth near this level has consequences for freighter fleets and airport cargo infrastructure alike. Passenger-belly capacity on key lanes has largely normalized since the pandemic, which means incremental volume now shifts toward dedicated freighters and the wet-lease and ACMI market.

Operators such as Atlas Air, ASL Airlines and other ACMI providers have reported strong utilization this year. Converters — Israel Aerospace Industries' Bedek division, and conversion lines run by Boeing, Airbus (via Elbe Flugzeugwerke and ST Engineering) — continue to feed mid-life 767s, A321s and 737-800s into fleets chasing this demand.

For cargo hubs in Asia — Hong Kong, Incheon, Shanghai Pudong — and North American gateways such as Anchorage, Louisville and Memphis, a 9% volume month tests terminal throughput, trucking connectivity and handling capacity rather than runway limits.

How solid is the signal?

One month does not establish a trend, and regional breakdowns can be skewed by base effects from a softer prior-year comparison. Still, September sits ahead of the traditional fourth-quarter peak, when electronics launches, holiday restocking and e-commerce events in China typically push volumes to their annual maximum.

If the reported growth holds into the peak season, carriers will face a choice between adding freighter capacity at premium wet-lease rates or leaving volume to ocean forwarders, whose own capacity has been disrupted by port congestion and Red Sea routing diversions throughout 2024.

Attention now shifts to the October and November data, which will show whether September's 9% rise was a pre-peak surge or the baseline for a fourth quarter in which demand runs ahead of freighter availability.