---
title: "IAD — Washington Dulles Airport, Washington · Orbit"
description: "Washington Dulles International Airport (IAD/KIAD) serves Washington, United States. Opened 1962, named after John Foster Dulles, 27.3 million passengers in 2024."
url: https://orbitflights.app/airports/iad
---

Washington · United States · North America

# IAD — Washington Dulles

Washington Dulles International Airport serves Washington, United States, 37 km from the city centre, and sits at 38.9°N, 77.5°W. This site carries 1 route touching it, with the great circle distance for each.

**IATA**
IAD
the code on your bag tag

**ICAO**
KIAD
used by air traffic control

**Opened**
1962
per Wikidata

**Passengers**
27.3M
in 2024

## History & name

Washington Dulles International Airport opened in 1962 and is named after Washington and John Foster Dulles (1888-1959), a United States Secretary of State. Run by the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority, it lies 37 km from Washington and handled 27.3 million passengers in 2024\. It has 4 runways, the longest 3,505 m.

Named after **John Foster Dulles** — United States Secretary of State (1888-1959)

Read more: [Wikipedia ↗](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Washington%5FDulles%5FInternational%5FAirport) · [Wikidata ↗](https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q466835)

## At a glance

**Full name**
Washington Dulles International Airport

**Serves**
Washington, United States

**City centre**
37 km from Washington

**Opened**
1962

**Operator**
Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority

**Passengers**
27.3 million in 2024

**Runways**
4 runways, longest 3,505 m

**Elevation**
312 ft (95 m)

**Map**
[Open in Google Maps ↗](https://www.google.com/maps/search/?api=1&query=38.94450,-77.45580)

**Website**
[mwaa.com ↗](http://www.mwaa.com/dulles/)

## Where it sits

38.9°N, 77.5°W puts IAD in the northern hemisphere, 4,330 km from the equator and 5,677 km from the North pole.

Of the 661 airports on this site it is the **191st** most northerly, which makes it the 471st most southerly.

## Straight through the middle

Straight down through the centre of the Earth comes out at 38.9°S, 102.5°E. The nearest airport on this site to that point is Perth (PER) in Australia, still 1,442 km away — most of the planet's antipodes are ocean.

## What’s near it

The closest other airport on this site is **Ronald Reagan Washington National** (DCA), 38 km away in a straight line. 2 airports here sit within 100 km — worth checking which one your ticket actually says.

DCA Ronald Reagan Washington National 38 km BWI Baltimore/Washington International Thurgood Marshall 73 km

## Distances from IAD

Great circle distance and an estimated time in the air.

| To                                                   |     | Distance | Estimated |
| ---------------------------------------------------- | --- | -------- | --------- |
| [London](https://orbitflights.app/routes/lhr-to-iad) | LHR | 5,902 km | 7h 50m    |

[Distance from IAD to any airport →](https://orbitflights.app/distance?from=IAD&to=LHR) [Map a trip from IAD →](https://orbitflights.app/tools/flight-route-map?r=IAD-LHR)

## Where these facts come from

The profile is looked up, not written from memory: type, runways, elevation and the official website from [OurAirports](https://ourairports.com/data/) (public domain); opening year, namesake, operator and passenger count from [Wikidata](https://www.wikidata.org/) (CC0); the city centre from [GeoNames](https://www.geonames.org/) (CC BY 4.0). Where a source has nothing, the line is left out. Distances, neighbours and the antipode are computed from the coordinates.

What you won’t find: terminal maps, airline lists, shops or live departures. Orbit is a logbook, not a flight tracker, and a page that guessed at those would be worse than one that leaves them out.

[Measure IAD to anywhere →](https://orbitflights.app/distance)

## Flown through IAD?

Orbit knows all 8,801 airports offline and works out the distance the moment you enter two codes.

[Download now](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.qwertybit.orbit)

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Markdown copy of https://orbitflights.app/airports/iad for language models and agents. Site index: https://orbitflights.app/llms.txt