Dubai is Building the World's Biggest Airport

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THIS is Dubai's Al Maktoum International Airport. An airport larger than Manhattan. It's less an airport than… a city with planes.

It has the capacity for more than 260M passengers every year. It will have five parallel runways. Four hundred aircraft gates. And ferry 12M tonnes of cargo annually.

Oh, and the price tag? US$35BN.

A render of Al Maktoum Airport post expansion Credit: Coop Himmelb(l)au

It’s the most ambitious piece of transport infrastructure on the planet. Not only is it set to radically transform the aviation industry, it could change the entire region forever.

At least... that’s the plan.

Al Maktoum Airport will break world records

Let’s just quickly list all the world records this airport will break. It will be the largest airport by passenger capacity, by cargo, and by runway capacity. It will have the largest terminal development and the largest footprint of any airport on Earth.

Who’s going to call Guinness? They need to print a whole new book.

Just like China became the factory of the world by producing about 30% of all manufactured goods, Dubai is setting itself up to be the world’s port. The hinge that cargo and people all transit through.

At first glance, it might seem like Dubai is overly confident here. This could be a situation of very much putting the horse before the cart. Or the enormous Manhattan-sized airport before the passengers.

And, wait a minute, I’m pretty sure Dubai already, quite famously, has an airport?

Dubai International Airport is perhaps one of the most important and significant pieces of transport infrastructure of this century so far. In 2024 it recorded 92M passengers. Then beat that number in 2025 with 95.2M.

Dubai International (blue) in relation to Al Maktoum (yellow).

Why is Dubai's aviation industry so important?

The aviation industry has radically changed Dubai on a fundamental level. Turning the city from a regional outpost into a bustling tourist powerhouse and a cargo hub. The sector created countless jobs: hotels, technology, attractions, retail. 

It helped diversify the economy away from oil and paved the way for all the superlatives that this little oasis loves to build. The world’s tallest building would likely not have been possible if not for the success of Dubai International.

And all of this comes down to a simple matter of geography. No single statistic puts it better: Dubai is within an eight-hour flight of two-thirds of the world’s entire population.

This has made it one of the premier hubs between Europe, Asia, Africa, Australia and North America. Dubai built its economy around this, around transit passengers and connecting the globe.

Now they want to level up. Because, you could argue, they’ve actually been too successful.

Let me explain. There’s simply no room to expand Dubai International, it is boxed in on every side by developments.

Dubai International is boxed-in by development, with no room to expand.

So with expansion of Dubai’s premiere airport impossible, the city set its sights further afield. A lot further.

In 2024, the $35BN expansion of Al Maktoum Airport was confirmed. 1 in every 5 jobs in Dubai is related to aviation. The city, quite frankly, needs the capacity to keep up with future demand.

So let’s look at what’s actually being built here. There will be two main terminal buildings connected to the city through a new express metro line.

How to build the world's biggest airport

The first thing you’ll notice about the main terminal is how wide and open it is. One of the architects' main ideas was that the terminal shouldn't feel like a series of enclosed halls, but a continuous public space.

The dilating roof spans enormous distances, uninterrupted by columns. Being a passenger arriving or departing here means you can see hundreds of metres across the entire airport.

And that’s because they don’t want this airport to feel like a maze. More often than not you’ll be able to see your gate with your own eyes rather than relying on signs - important for a hub as international as this one.

The huge halls also mean the airport can be updated or reconfigured later on. It will, theoretically, be future-proof.

The roof itself is inspired by desert dunes and they ripple across the entire length of the airport. This carries the surrounding desert into the architecture itself.

The 'dune'-like roof of Al Maktoum Airport Credit: Coop Himmelb(l)au

There’s also a serious ton of greenery. Now, we’re used to seeing a lot of “greenwashing” in our renders, but for an airport in an arid climate like this these plants play another role: they will help to cool this enormous building.

Trees continuously release water vapour through their leaves. While this wouldn’t replace air conditioning entirely, it will help localised areas feel cooler. Let’s face it, anyone transiting through Dubai on a long haul flight will take what they can get.

Work started over a year ago on the airport’s runway infrastructure and the initial structural foundations for passenger terminals and gates.

Right now, the supporting infrastructure and facilities are being built. In May of 2026 there was a groundbreaking ceremony for the huge new Emirates engineering complex.

This $5.1BN engineering facility will include the largest free-span hangar in the world at a width of 285 metres. It will have the largest dedicated landing gear workshop in the world and unparalleled workshop and logistics spaces.

So we didn’t actually manage to cover all the world records earlier, but in our defence - they really are trying to break every aviation record possible.

There are several reasons for this massive new space. Unlike many airlines, Emirates operates almost exclusively Airbus A380s and Boeing 777s. These are some very big planes. Actually, among the largest passenger aircraft around right now.

This new complex is designed to service 28 wide-body aircraft simultaneously, more than any other single engineering facility in the world.

Emirates will be able to grow alongside the airport. All of this, every part of it, is designed for massive scalability.

The next phase of work will focus on building the Western Passenger Terminal, a fourth aircraft concourse building, an automated shuttle and the baggage handling system.

A render of Al Maktoum's entrance hall Credit: Coop Himmelb(l)au.

This phase includes the construction of four underground railway stations and runways 2 and 3.

The final phase will be the construction of the East Terminal which will extend the new metro line. Eventually this will be a 14-station system connecting all airside buildings in a giant loop.

"A city with planes"

Now, I said before this isn’t just an airport. It’s essentially a whole city.

Around the terminals and runways will be housing for more than 1M people. The airport is part of a much larger development for Dubai South.

When it is finished, Dubai South will be similar in scope to a medium-sized city rather than just a suburb. The masterplan is divided into dedicated districts, each serving a different purpose for the airport. There’s a logistics district, a commercial district, a business park and more.

This housing will partly be for the workers at the airport, for logistics and freight operations and for aviation-related businesses and maintenance facilities.

Al Maktoum is expected to create nearly half a million jobs. So this surrounding mini-city does make sense.

Eventually all of this will link to the city’s main infrastructure including the trainlines. I mentioned the metros before. The plan is for the Gold Line to extend to the airport, while the Blue line will soon reach the eastern and southern parts of the city. This will make it easier to add future extensions towards Dubai South.

Etihad’s rail network will also eventually connect to the airport.

The idea is for this to not just be an airport, but a fully connected transportation mega-hub.

The challenges

Now, Dubai wrote the book on turning sand into… well, not sandcastles, but entire cities. So they know a thing or two about combating harsh desert environments. Good thing too, because building an airport this size here isn’t going to be easy.

First thing: desert sand is incredibly variable. That means not only is it different nearly everywhere, how it settles is dependent on the weight of the load above - and the world’s biggest airport, for example, is a pretty heavy load.

Before construction, engineers had to carry out extensive geotechnical investigations. Then, they compacted the existing sand and replaced weak material where necessary.

Deep pile foundations are needed to transfer the load of the building’s weight onto denser soils or rock layers far below the sand.

Of course, Dubai has done this countless times before, but again, the issue here is the sheer scale of this project.

Building the five runways will also require expert precision. Each one will have to meet strict requirements for flatness, slope, and strength.

Runways are engineered with subtle crossfalls so rainwater drains quickly without creating standing water that could endanger aircraft. Yes, even Dubai has to take rainwater into account.

The city regularly exceeds 45°C in summer - and having barely survived the heatwaves that hit London this summer, I can’t even imagine working in temperatures that high.

This limits the number of safe hours construction crews can work, it also changes how concrete cures and even expands steel.

Typically this means that concrete pours have to be scheduled overnight, or very early in the morning.

Dubai has built its reputation over the last few decades as a safe place for tourism, finance, transit, and just about everything else. But, that reputation has unfortunately suffered intense damage..

Al Maktoum will break records - it might even break the record for the most records broken by an airport. Seeing this giant marvel sit empty would be heartbreaking, but the challenges it faces are far greater than just building on sand.

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Additional footage and images: Coop Himmelb(l)au, BBC News

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