Ryanair to Quit Bremen From April 2027 Over Fees and German Air Taxes

Ryanair will end all operations at Bremen Airport from April 2027, withdrawing roughly 500,000 seats a year from the northern German city after nearly two decades of service. The Irish carrier, which carries about 400,000 passengers annually through Bremen (BRE), confirmed the exit in a press release on Oct. 8, 2026. Its Bremen flights had already vanished from the booking site days earlier — the confirmation was, in effect, a formality.

Why is Ryanair leaving Bremen?

The airline blames money: airport fees, and the wider German cost stack behind them. Chief Commercial Officer Jason McGuinness was blunt.

"This decision is a direct consequence of Bremen Airport's excessive fees, along with Germany's exorbitant air traffic tax, air navigation service charges, security fees, and high airport charges, which have forced Bremen out of the market," McGuinness said.

Ryanair also urged Federal Transport Minister Steffen Bilger to take "urgent action" on what it called Germany's "collapsing" air transport market. The capacity, it says, will move to "more competitive airports" across Europe that are actively cutting access costs. Roughly half a million seats a year will now seek friendlier runways elsewhere.

Bremen is not an isolated cut. Ryanair will close its seven-aircraft base at Berlin Brandenburg on Oct. 24, part of a broader retrenchment in a market it considers structurally overpriced.

Which routes disappear?

Six destinations currently link Bremen to Ryanair's network:

• London Stansted (STN)
• Palma de Mallorca (PMI)
• Alicante (ALC)
• Málaga (AGP)
• Zadar (ZAD)
• Lamezia Terme (SUF)

Flights continue as normal through the 2026-27 winter schedule, which ends in late March. Then the routes stop.

This is the second withdrawal, not the first. As ch-aviation reported, Ryanair closed its two-aircraft Bremen base on Nov. 5, 2018, but kept serving the city with aircraft based elsewhere. From April 2027 the exit is total.

How have German officials responded?

Not warmly. Kai Stürenberg, Bremen's state councillor for ports, called the decision a "massive disruption" in an interview with regional broadcaster Buten un binnen — and questioned the airline's recent record on the airport.

"In March, Ryanair said Bremen Airport was great. They claimed the conditions and framework were excellent, everything was fine. Now, however, they've made demands that are completely impossible to meet — neither legally, due to state aid regulations, nor economically. If we're expected to contribute up to 5 euros per passenger, then this isn't negotiable. This is unacceptable," Stürenberg said.

A subsidy of up to €5 per passenger — roughly €2 million a year at current traffic levels — is, on the state's reading, both unlawful under European state aid rules and uneconomic. Bremen's Ministry of Economic Affairs went further, saying Ryanair wanted to use the airport's infrastructure "virtually free of charge."

Both sides, note, agree on the arithmetic. They simply disagree on who should pay it.

What does Bremen lose?

The city loses an established carrier, 500,000 annual seats, and connectivity for tourism and business — notably the London link, the route most likely to matter to the regional economy. Whether another operator picks up Stansted, Palma or the Spanish leisure routes at comparable frequency and fare is the open question. History suggests such gaps rarely fill quickly.

For Ryanair, the move is consistent with its long-standing playbook: extract cost concessions, and relocate capacity when they do not materialize. Germany's taxes and charges give the airline its narrative; Bremen's state aid constraints give the airport its refusal. The dispute now moves to Berlin, where Bilger faces industry pressure to address the cost base that Ryanair says is hollowing out German aviation — and April 2027, when Bremen finds out what its schedule looks like without it.