# İstanbul Airport (IST)

> Arnavutköy, Istanbul, TR · IATA: IST · ICAO: LTFM · Large Airport · Cargo Hub

## Quick Facts

| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| IATA | `IST` |
| ICAO | `LTFM` |
| City | Arnavutköy, Istanbul |
| Country | TR |
| Type | Large Airport |
| Elevation | 99 m |
| Cargo | ✅ |
| Cargo Rank | #1 |
| GPS | 41.26130, 28.74195 |

## Description

Close to 2 million tonnes of air cargo in 2024, up almost a quarter year on year, and a climb from 47th to 17th place among the world's cargo airports in five years: İstanbul Airport (IATA: IST, ICAO: LTFM) has rewritten European freight rankings since opening in 2019. Turkish Cargo, the freight arm of Turkish Airlines and one of the world's three largest cargo carriers, moved about 1.21 million tonnes in the first seven months of 2025 alone. In September 2025 FedEx opened a new global air transit facility here, sized at 25,300 m² and able to process up to 7,000 packages an hour — triple its previous sorting capacity — fed by 30 weekly FedEx flights to North America, Europe and the Middle East. On the ground the fully automated SmartIST terminal (live since February 2022) offers 2.2 million tonnes of annual capacity with dedicated pharma and cold-chain zones; a USD 2.3 billion programme aims to lift that to 4.5 million tonnes by 2028 and add a dedicated e-commerce facility in 2026. On the passenger side IST led Europe with around 84 million travellers in 2025, having replaced the closed Atatürk Airport. Its position between European, Asian, Middle Eastern and African markets keeps much of the tonnage in transit between the Far East and Europe. Road access runs via the O-7 and O-3 motorways, the M11 metro has served the airport since 2023, and forwarders across south-eastern Europe reach it through Turkish Cargo's dense road-feeder network into the Balkans.

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*Freight Academy — Airport Profile: [https://www.freight-academy.com/en/information/airports/istanbul-airport-ist](https://www.freight-academy.com/en/information/airports/istanbul-airport-ist)*

*Markdown mirror: [https://www.freight-academy.com/api/md/airports/en/istanbul-airport-ist](https://www.freight-academy.com/api/md/airports/en/istanbul-airport-ist)*

*LLM-Summary (JSON): https://www.freight-academy.com/api/v1/airports/istanbul-airport-ist/llm-summary*