Tbilisi airport is doubling to 10 million passengers while a second airport is proposed for 2032

The works take boarding bridges from five to ten and add seven remote aircraft stands, nine check-in counters, 24 passport control points and two baggage belts, alongside upgraded passenger areas and expanded parking. Those are throughput items rather than runway items: the constraint being relieved is how many people can be processed per hour at peak, which is the constraint that actually caps arrivals in July and August.

TAV Georgia, the Georgian subsidiary of TAV Airports, owned by Groupe ADP, is the sole operator of both Tbilisi and Batumi airports. The expansion follows a January 2025 agreement between the Economy Ministry, United Airports of Georgia and TAV Georgia that extends the concession to 2032. The concession end date and the proposed opening date of the second airport are the same year, which is unlikely to be a coincidence.

Deputy Economy Minister Tamar Ioseliani said the Vaziani airport is expected to open in 2032 with capacity for up to 20 million passengers a year. Opposition figure Roman Gotsiridze put its cost at 3.5 billion lari, about 1.3 billion dollars, and questioned spending on both schemes. An industry source speaking anonymously told OC Media that no tender had been announced, which suggests the expansion of the existing airport is the live project and the new one is still a proposal. The government did not respond to a request for comment.

Every forecast of visitor numbers, short-let occupancy and retail footfall in Tbilisi rests on how many people can physically get in. At 5.4 million passengers against a nominal five million capacity, the airport was already running at the edge in 2025. Doubling the ceiling by 2028 is therefore the single most consequential infrastructure line for anyone whose income depends on arrivals — more so than any individual hotel or tower announcement.