Bucharest Airport Guide: Romania’s Henri Coanda Hub
Bucharest Airport, officially Henri Coanda International, is Romania's main gateway and the home of TAROM. Runways, terminals, routes and spotting.
By The Aviation Hub
7 min read
Updated October 20, 2026 
Bucharest Airport, known officially as Henri Coanda International Airport and to most locals simply as Otopeni, lies about 10 miles (16.5 km) north of the Romanian capital’s centre beside the DN1 road. It is by far the busiest airport in Romania and the main hub of the national carrier TAROM, as well as a large Wizz Air base. Around 17 million passengers a year pass through a pair of parallel runways and a terminal complex that has grown piece by piece since the 1960s. Romania’s entry into the Schengen area in 2024 and 2025 reshaped how the building works.
Bucharest Airport at a Glance
The IATA code is OTP and the ICAO code is LROP. The airport sits in the town of Otopeni in Ilfov County, roughly 10 miles (16.5 km) north of Piata Unirii in the city centre, at an elevation of 96 m (314 ft). There are two parallel runways and one terminal complex, usually described as a departures hall and an arrivals hall joined by a shopping walkway and an airside finger pier.
Bucharest Airport handled about 15.9 million passengers in 2024 and 17 million in 2025, a long way above the 8.3 million recorded in 2014. TAROM is headquartered here, and Wizz Air, Ryanair, HiSky and Animawings all operate bases. The military side hosts the Romanian Air Force’s 90th Airlift Base. The state owned Compania Nationala Aeroporturi Bucuresti runs it alongside the smaller Baneasa field, and the airport’s official website carries live flight and parking information.
How Bucharest’s Airport Came to Be
Otopeni began life as a military air base, and the German air force used it during the Second World War. Until the mid 1960s Baneasa, closer to the city, was Bucharest’s only commercial airport, but its short runway could not take the jets then arriving. A new civil airport opened at Otopeni in 1965 with a 3,500 m runway that counted among the longest in Europe at the time, and a VIP lounge opened for President Nixon’s visit in August 1969.
A new passenger terminal opened in April 1970, and a second runway followed in 1986. The post communist years brought steady modernisation, with a new departures hall in the late 1990s, and in May 2004 the airport took the name of Henri Coanda, the Romanian pioneer who built the Coanda 1910 aircraft and identified the Coanda effect. Phase III of the master plan began in 2009, delivering a 15 gate concourse in March 2011 and an extended departure hall in November 2012.
The decisive change came in March 2012, when all scheduled low cost traffic moved from Baneasa to Otopeni, pushing passenger numbers up by 41 per cent in a single year. Blue Air’s collapse in 2022 removed a home grown rival, but Wizz Air and Ryanair filled the gap. Schengen air border checks ended in March 2024, followed by full membership in January 2025.
Runways at Bucharest Airport
Bucharest Airport has two parallel asphalt runways of identical length. Runway 08R/26L and runway 08L/26R both measure 3,500 m (11,484 ft) and are 45 m wide, enough for any aircraft in service, which matters for the TAROM Boeing 737 MAX 8 fleet and the occasional Boeing 777 or Airbus A330 government and charter movement. The pair is normally used in segregated mode, with one runway handling arrivals and the other departures.
In westerly winds the 26 direction brings arrivals in over farmland to the east of the airport. Easterly operations bring approaches in from the west, across the DN1. Fog is the main operational problem in winter, and the airport has invested in Category III instrument landing systems to keep schedules intact. A military apron sits apart from the civil terminals.
Terminals and Airlines
The terminal complex reads as one long building. The departures hall opened in the late 1990s and was extended in 2012, and the arrivals hall followed in 2000, with a covered shopping walkway linking the two. The airside finger, enlarged in 2011, was split into Schengen and non Schengen flows, and since 2025 the Schengen section handles the great majority of flights, which has eased the queues at passport control that once defined the place.
TAROM is the resident flag carrier with its Boeing 737-800, 737 MAX 8 and ATR 72-600 fleet and SkyTeam membership. Wizz Air is the largest airline at Bucharest Airport by passengers, running a big Airbus A321neo base. Ryanair follows, and the Romanian start up HiSky has grown quickly with Airbus A320 family aircraft. Lufthansa, Austrian, KLM, Air France, British Airways, Turkish Airlines, Qatar Airways and El Al bring the alliance networks. The TAROM business lounge and a Priority Pass lounge serve premium travellers.
Routes and Destinations
London has long been the busiest route, split across Luton, Stansted and Heathrow, reflecting the large Romanian community in the UK. Istanbul, Rome, Bergamo, Vienna, Amsterdam, Tel Aviv, Frankfurt, Paris and Madrid completed the international top ten in 2024. Domestically, Cluj Napoca, Timisoara and Iasi lead, with Oradea, Sibiu and Suceava behind them, although TAROM’s domestic network has thinned as Wizz Air and HiSky have grown.
Long haul is limited. Qatar Airways serves Doha, flydubai links Dubai and Etihad plans to start Abu Dhabi flights in December 2026, while TAROM has talked for years about relaunching its own intercontinental flights without doing so. HiSky flies to New York JFK, a service it resumed in June 2024, at about 4,700 miles (7,600 km). Summer brings a wave of seasonal flights to the Greek islands, Turkey and Spain. Freight is modest but growing, with DHL, UPS, Turkish Cargo and Saudia Cargo operating from the cargo apron.
Getting to and from Bucharest Airport
Trains finally reached Bucharest Airport in December 2020, when a new station opened beside the terminal at the end of a short spur from the main line. CFR services to Gara de Nord run roughly every 40 minutes and take about 20 to 25 minutes for a fare of around 6 lei (less than £1.50), which makes them the cheapest sensible option. Metro Line M6 to the airport is under construction.
Express bus 100 runs around the clock to Piata Unirii in the centre in 35 to 50 minutes depending on the DN1 traffic, and bus 442 links the airport with Piata Presei Libere. Taxis are ordered through touchscreen kiosks in the arrivals hall, a system introduced in 2013 to stop touting, and a ride to the centre costs around 60 to 80 lei (£10 to £14). Uber and Bolt pick up from the upper level of the multi storey car park. Road access is from the DN1, with the A3 motorway link easing congestion from the north. The multi storey car park sits opposite the departures hall.
Spotting and Photography
The classic spots at Bucharest Airport lie off the DN1 road near the western approach lights, where arrivals pass low in easterly weather, and around Tunari and Dimieni at the eastern end, where arrivals on 26L descend over fields. Most spots beside the fence need a permit from the airport, so arrange one before you go.
At the eastern end the light is best from the afternoon to sunset, as mornings are backlit. The variety is modest, with Wizz Air A321neos and Ryanair 737s dominating, but the TAROM fleet, government aircraft, Qatar Airways jets and the Romanian Air Force C-27J Spartan and C-130 Hercules movements reward patience. Keep off the perimeter road, respect the signs at the military zone, and remember that photography of the air force side can draw attention from security staff.
What Comes Next
The airport has outgrown its terminal, and the operator’s plan is a new Terminal 2 at the eastern end of the site, designed to be built in modular blocks of around 5 million passengers each until it reaches 20 million. Funding has been debated for over a decade, and in 2023 the transport minister even argued that a new terminal was not needed in the near future. Runway capacity is not the constraint; the terminal and the landside roads are.
Bucharest Airport is heading for a long overdue second terminal and a metro connection, with Schengen membership already boosting its appeal as a regional hub. Compare it with the other eastern European gateways on our Airports of the World map.
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