Did you know? Ljubljana's Brnik airport welcomed its first aircraft on Christmas Eve 1963

Slovenia's main airport began operating with a festive date. According to the history published by its operator, Fraport Slovenija, the first aircraft landed at the new Ljubljana airport at Brnik on Christmas Eve 1963, and scheduled traffic started in January 1964.

The airport grew steadily over the following decades. Lufthansa opened a weekly cargo route to Frankfurt in 1971, and the airport welcomed its millionth passenger in November of that year. A DC-10 landed for the first time in 1973, the runway was rebuilt and navigation systems modernised in 1978, and traffic reached a record 886,248 passengers in 1987.

Slovenia's independence in 1991 turned Brnik into the country's central state airport, although airspace closures at the time sharply reduced traffic. The company became a joint stock company in 1997, construction of a new passenger terminal began in 2006 and, in 2007, the airport was renamed Ljubljana Jože Pučnik Airport. Fraport AG agreed to buy a majority stake in 2014, took full ownership in 2015, and the company adopted the Fraport Slovenija name in 2017.

More recent milestones include the airport's 60th anniversary in 2024 and the opening of a new taxiway, Taxiway J, in August 2025; the operator says it handled nearly 1.6 million passengers in 2025. Travellers flying to Slovenia should check current routes and terminal information directly with the airport before departure.