King Abdulaziz International Airport

JED OEJN  Jeddah, Saudi Arabia

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JED at a glance

  • What it is: King Abdulaziz International Airport is a major international airport serving Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.
  • Codes: JED on your ticket, OEJN on the radar.
  • How busy: the reference profile lists about 42.7 million annual passengers across 3 runways.
  • Main airline: Saudia bases aircraft here.
  • Local time zone: Asia/Riyadh (UTC+3), so every time shown for JED is local rather than UTC.
42.7M
Annual passengers (reference)
3
Runways
3
Terminals
48 ft
Field elevation

About JED

Saudi Arabia's busiest airport and the principal gateway for Hajj and Umrah pilgrims travelling to Mecca. Its tent-roofed Hajj Terminal can process hundreds of thousands of pilgrims during the season. A modern Terminal 1 opened in 2019 as Saudia's main base.

King Abdulaziz International Airport opened in 1981, replacing Jeddah's old Kandara airport as the gateway to Saudi Arabia's Red Sea coast and, above all, to the holy city of Mecca.

Its most celebrated feature is the Hajj Terminal, designed by Skidmore, Owings and Merrill: a vast complex sheltered by a tent-like roof of Teflon-coated fiberglass that covers one of the largest roofed areas in the world while remaining open to the air beneath. The design won the Aga Khan Award for Architecture in 1983 and remains an icon of modern engineering fused with pilgrimage tradition.

For decades the airport operated with aging North and South terminals while handling the annual surge of millions of pilgrims during Hajj and the year-round flow of Umrah travelers.

A transformative new Terminal 1 opened in stages from 2019, consolidating Saudia's hub operations in a modern complex with a dedicated high-speed rail link toward Mecca and Medina. As Saudi Arabia pursues its Vision 2030 tourism ambitions, Jeddah's airport is being positioned for major growth, with expansion plans intended to make it one of the largest gateways in the Middle East.

How JED operates today

King Abdulaziz International operates three parallel north-south runways serving a split terminal system: the modern Terminal 1 hosts Saudia and most international carriers, the older North Terminal handles some foreign airlines. The famous tent-roofed Hajj Terminal springs to life during pilgrimage seasons to process chartered flights from across the Muslim world.

Saudia uses Jeddah as its principal hub alongside low-cost operators flynas and flyadeal. The Haramain high-speed railway connects the airport to Mecca and Medina, underpinning its role as the primary air gateway for Umrah and Hajj pilgrims year-round.

Top routes from JED

DestinationMain airlinesWhy it matters
Riyadh (RUH) Saudia, flynas, flyadeal The Jeddah-Riyadh corridor is one of the busiest domestic routes in the world.
Cairo (CAI) Saudia, EgyptAir, flynas Links huge Egyptian expatriate and pilgrim flows to the kingdom.
Dubai (DXB) Emirates, Saudia, flydubai The essential business bridge between the Red Sea coast and the Gulf.
Istanbul (IST) Turkish Airlines, Saudia A dense link for trade, tourism and pilgrimage connections through Turkey.
Jakarta (CGK) Saudia, Garuda Indonesia Carries pilgrims from Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim nation.

Facts about JED

  • The Hajj Terminal's fiberglass tent roof covers one of the largest roofed areas in the world, yet the space beneath is largely open-air.
  • The Hajj Terminal won the Aga Khan Award for Architecture in 1983.
  • The Hajj Terminal operates at full capacity only a few weeks each year, during the pilgrimage season.
  • The airport includes a dedicated Royal Terminal reserved for the Saudi royal family and state guests.

Plane spotting at JED

Photography around Saudi airports is restricted, so spotting is largely limited to terminal windows, which during Hajj season frame one of aviation's great spectacles: widebody charters arriving from all over the Muslim world. New to spotting? Start with our aircraft identification guide and the world's best spotting airports.

IATA / ICAO
JED / OEJN
Location
Jeddah, Saudi Arabia 21.680, 39.157
Time zone
Asia/Riyadh
Opened
1981
Hub for
Saudia, flynas, flyadeal
Website
www.jed-airport.com

Airlines hubbed at JED

SV · SVA Saudia Saudi Arabia

Tracked flights using JED

Selected scheduled services whose curated route starts, ends or stops at King Abdulaziz International Airport.

FlightRouteTypical aircraft
MS911 CAI → JED Boeing 777-300ERTrack MS911 →
SV21 JED → JFK Boeing 777-300ERTrack SV21 →
SV117 JED → LHR Boeing 787-10Track SV117 →
SV1020 RUH → JED Airbus A321Track SV1020 →
SV816 CGK → JED Boeing 777-300ERTrack SV816 →
SV301 JED → CAI Airbus A330-300Track SV301 →

Nearby and related airports

Geographically close airports and useful alternatives in Saudi Arabia.

LXR Luxor International Airport Luxor, Egypt RUH King Khalid International Airport Riyadh, Saudi Arabia CAI Cairo International Airport Cairo, Egypt ADD Addis Ababa Bole International Airport Addis Ababa, Ethiopia NBO Jomo Kenyatta International Airport Nairobi, Kenya

More airports and guides connected to JED

Most of the tails you see here belong to Saudia. How a field like this runs day to day is covered in how airports work. Nearby, Riyadh (RUH) serves the same country. The codes JED and OEJN are explained in airport codes decoded.

Data sources and review

Reviewed 2026-07-29 by Flight-Tracker.net Editorial Team

Passenger, runway, terminal and hub figures are maintained as a reviewed reference snapshot, not a live operational record. Check the airport directly before travelling.

Read our airport data sourcing and review process, or inspect the machine-readable reference dataset.

Frequently asked questions about JED

What is the airport code for King Abdulaziz International Airport?

King Abdulaziz International Airport uses the IATA code JED on tickets and baggage tags, and the ICAO code OEJN in flight plans and on radar. The leading “O” in OEJN is the region marker: ICAO codes are grouped geographically, which is why airports near each other usually share their first letter or two while their IATA codes look unrelated.

How many runways does JED have?

King Abdulaziz International Airport operates 3 runways across 3 passenger terminals. The field sits at 48 ft above sea level.

How busy is JED?

This reference profile lists roughly 42.7 million annual passengers for King Abdulaziz International Airport. You can see aircraft observed departing, arriving and overhead on this page, taken from live ADS-B broadcasts.

Which airlines are based at JED?

Saudia treat JED as a hub or major base. Many other carriers serve the airport without basing aircraft there.

How many terminals does JED have?

This reference lists King Abdulaziz International Airport with 3 passenger terminals. Check the airport or operating airline for the terminal assigned to a specific flight.

What time zone is JED in?

King Abdulaziz International Airport runs on Asia/Riyadh, currently UTC+3. Flight trackers work in UTC internally, so the seven-day history on our flight pages is stamped UTC while the boards on this page are in JED local time - worth remembering when the two disagree by a whole calendar day.

Can I track flights at JED live?

Yes. The map on this page shows every aircraft broadcasting its position within about 55 km of King Abdulaziz International Airport. The boards split them into departures, arrivals and traffic passing overhead, all timed in Asia/Riyadh.