A landing fee is a charge paid by an aircraft

Aircraft

An aircraft is a vehicle that is able to fly by gaining support from the air, or, in general, the atmosphere of a planet. An aircraft counters the force of gravity by using either static lift or by using the dynamic lift of an airfoil, or in a few cases the downward thrust from jet engines.Although...

 to an airport company for landing at a particular airport

Airport

An airport is a location where aircraft such as fixed-wing aircraft, helicopters, and blimps take off and land. Aircraft may be stored or maintained at an airport...

. Landing fees can vary greatly between airports, with congested airports, ones where most of the landing slots

Landing slots

Landing slots or Airport slots are rights allocated to an entity by an airport or government agency granting the slot owner the right to schedule a landing or departure during a specific time period....

 are held by airlines being able to charge premium prices because of supply and demand, while less congested airports charge less because the demand is not as high. The money generated by landing fees is used to pay for the maintenance or expansion of the airport's buildings, runways, apron

Airport ramp

The airport ramp or apron is part of an airport. It is usually the area where aircraft are parked, unloaded or loaded, refueled or boarded. Although the use of the apron is covered by regulations, such as lighting on vehicles, it is typically more accessible to users than the runway or taxiway...

s and taxiway

Taxiway

A taxiway is a path on an airport connecting runways with ramps, hangars, terminals and other facilities. They mostly have hard surface such as asphalt or concrete, although smaller airports sometimes use gravel or grass....

s.

Landing fees can also be used to attract more flights by keeping the fees low. Some airports, especially general aviation

General aviation

General aviation is one of the two categories of civil aviation. It refers to all flights other than military and scheduled airline and regular cargo flights, both private and commercial. General aviation flights range from gliders and powered parachutes to large, non-scheduled cargo jet flights...

airports do not charge landing fees.

There may be a correlation between the amount of traffic an airport can manage and its fees, based on the assumption that a larger airport can handle more traffic and thus spread the total airport maintenance and operating costs out over more carriers, as well as being able to generate more revenues from concessions, retail, parking and other services.

Landing fees may encompass additional airports provided services. Some airports will simply charge a single fee for landing and provide gates and check-in facilies as part of that fee. Other airports will charge a lower fee for landing but will charge airlines for the use of gates and check-in facilities.

Landing fees cannot be compared since a number of factors affect the amount of landing fees. For example, many airports in the United States receive subsidies from the FAA while airports in Canada do not. Canadian airports are actually "taxed" in the form of ground rent.

Fees can be based on any number of factors including:

• Weight;
• Number of seats;
• Time of day;
• Aircraft home airport (some airports do not charge fees for aircraft based at that airport or offer a lower fee for them);
• Operator class (some airports may charge a fee for specific types of operators, like part 135 or 121, and not other aircraft operators).