ADS: Q1 2025 aircraft orders up 73% year-on-year
May 2, 2025
Aircraft orders placed in the first quarter of 2025 have grown 73% compared to Q1 2024, UK trade association ADS has revealed; concluding that despite ongoing tariff uncertainty, industry can nevertheless “deliver strong performance metrics and support UK competitiveness in the global aerospace market”.
A total of 521 commercial Airbus, Boeing and Comac aircraft orders were placed during the first quarter of the year, with growing demand for both single-aisle and wide-body aircraft. Despite deliveries also up 20% in the first quarter of 2025, a new record-high backlog (up 1% year-on-year) now stands at almost 16,000 units.
Commercial aircraft orders from January alone (growing 168% year-on-year) marked a particularly positive momentum to the start of 2025, something ADS described as “representing a return of confidence among airline decision-makers, echoing trends seen in 2022 and 2023”. The 71 units delivered in January 2025 also represented the highest January delivery rate since 2019.
However, with this round of ADS data curtailed just two days before the US announced its most recent tariff increase on US imports, ongoing uncertainty could cause extended turbulence. A recent example of this was exemplified by two Boeing 737-8s destined for China’s Xiamen Airlines which were returned to Seattle following the Chinese government’s decision to ban its airlines from taking delivery of US-made aerospace items.
ADS states that “the recent tariffs introduced by the US Administration on 2 April are still being evaluated by industry leaders, with disruption to trade and supply chains likely to affect aircraft deliveries in the coming months”, compounded by “broader international reactions to the evolving US trade policy”.
ADS is therefore “calling on the UK government to seek exemptions for civil aircraft, engine parts and components as part of [the UK’s trade negotiations to ensure the free movement of aerospace goods in line with the longstanding WTO Agreement on Trade in Civil Aircraft”.
