Ninoy Aquino International Airport — Manila (Pasay), Philippines

Manila's primary gateway carries a name with heavy political weight: Ninoy Aquino International Airport, coded MNL, honors the opposition senator gunned down on its tarmac in 1983 after returning from exile, a killing that helped ignite the movement which toppled the Marcos dictatorship a few years later. Spread across Pasay and Parañaque on the edge of Metro Manila, the airport today handles a passenger volume that has long outpaced its physical capacity, with two intersecting runways creating chronic congestion that international rankings have repeatedly singled out. Four terminals serve different carriers and route types, with Philippine Airlines and Cebu Pacific anchoring domestic and international schedules that connect the archipelago's thousands of islands to Asia, the Middle East, North America, and beyond. Ongoing modernization and long-discussed plans for a new Manila-area airport reflect years of debate over how to relieve pressure on this historically overburdened but indispensable hub.