Private flight requests originating in Abu Dhabi rose 59.5% year on year, according to XO, a private aviation marketplace. The company published the figures on 30 September under the headline that GCC business travel is accelerating, and they point to a market in which Gulf travellers book private jets closer to the day they fly. Demand on the Abu Dhabi to Riyadh route rose 450%, XO said.
These are company figures, and they should be read as such. They are growth rates, not volumes. The sources do not give absolute flight numbers, aircraft types or fleet size, so the percentages show how fast demand is changing, not how large it is.
The numbers
The Zawya copy of the XO release also cites a 140% rise in flights in the 12 months to 31 August 2026. It does not say how that figure is measured, so it is best read with the same caution.
The pattern on timing is clearer. Across the GCC, bookings made within seven days of departure rose 13.8%, TradeArabia reports. The median booking lead time, the gap between booking and flying, fell 23.9%. In plain terms, customers are booking closer to departure.
The two measures are two views of the same shift. A rise in last-week bookings and a fall in the median lead time both say that fewer customers are planning their private flights weeks ahead. TradeArabia does not say whether the change is led by business owners, first-time flyers or both.
XO links the trend to Abu Dhabi's growing role as a regional business and investment hub, and to economic integration across GCC cities. The article also ties the growth to Abu Dhabi Economic Vision 2030 and Abu Dhabi Mobility.
Who is flying
The customer base is widening. According to the release, a growing number of younger first-time flyers are joining business owners and high-net-worth customers. Earlier data from Vista had already shown a rise in first-time flyers under 45.
Youssef Mouallem, Chief Business Officer at Vista, said in the release that customers want to save time, retain flexibility and avoid unnecessary complexity. Read alongside the shorter booking window, that is a description of a traveller who decides late and expects the arrangements to be simple.
Dubai is not mentioned in the Zawya text of the release, which keeps the focus on Abu Dhabi and on the wider GCC.
Abu Dhabi to Riyadh
The 450% rise on the Abu Dhabi to Riyadh route is the most striking number in the release, and it is also the one that most needs its caveat. A route that begins from a small base can show a very large percentage with a modest number of flights. XO has not published the underlying counts.
What the figure does show is direction. A route between two capitals of Gulf economies is attracting more requests, which fits the release's wider story of business travel between GCC cities.
Where the aircraft land
Abu Dhabi has a dedicated airport for this kind of travel. Al Bateen Executive Airport is described as the only airport in the Middle East dedicated to business aviation. Jetex runs its VIP and VVIP terminals under a 2023 agreement with Abu Dhabi Airports, according to Eye of Riyadh.
Bombardier is building a facility of roughly 120,000 sq ft at Al Bateen to service aircraft, which the company planned to open in the second half of 2026, according to a release from December 2025. Whether it has now opened is not covered by the sources used here.
AIN's monthly roundup of Argus data, published on 8 October, puts the global picture in context. It reports September business aviation activity above forecast, with large-cabin fractional activity up 13.9%. That is a worldwide figure, not a Gulf one.
What it means
It helps to keep the figures apart. The 59.5% is the year-on-year rise in requests from Abu Dhabi. The 450% is demand on one route. The 13.8% is the rise in bookings made within seven days of departure across the GCC, and the 23.9% is the fall in median lead time. Each measures a different thing, and none of them is a count of flights.
For readers in the Gulf, the XO figures are one more sign that private aviation is being used as a working tool, for trips that are planned late and cover short distances between cities. Short lead times put a premium on operators that can respond quickly and on airports that can handle a flight at short notice.
The numbers also come with limits. XO and Vista are commercial sources with a stake in the market, the copies of the story trace to a single release, and nothing in them states how many flights lie behind a given percentage. The direction is plain. The size is not yet known.
Sources: Zawya, TradeArabia, Eye of Riyadh, Aviation and Defence Universe