- IATA
- IAH
- the code on your bag tag
- ICAO
- KIAH
- used by air traffic control
- Opened
- 1969
- per Wikidata
- Passengers
- 48.1M
- in 2025
History & name
George Bush Intercontinental Airport takes its name from Houston and from George Bush, President of the United States from 1989 to 1993. Opened in 1969 and run by the Houston Airport System, it lies 25 km from Houston and handled 48.1 million passengers in 2025 on 5 runways, the longest 3,658 m.
Named afterGeorge H. W. Bush — 41st President of the United States (1989–1993)
Read more: Wikipedia ↗ · Wikidata ↗
At a glance
- Full name
- George Bush Intercontinental Airport
- Serves
- Houston, United States
- City centre
- 25 km from Houston
- Opened
- 1969
- Operator
- Houston Airport System
- Passengers
- 48.1 million in 2025
- Runways
- 5 runways, longest 3,658 m
- Elevation
- 97 ft (30 m)
- Website
- fly2houston.com ↗
Where it sits
30.0°N, 95.3°W puts IAH in the northern hemisphere, 3,334 km from the equator and 6,673 km from the North pole.
Of the 661 airports on this site it is the 307th most northerly, which makes it the 355th most southerly.
Straight through the middle
Straight down through the centre of the Earth comes out at 30.0°S, 84.7°E. The nearest airport on this site to that point is Sir Seewoosagur Ramgoolam (MRU) in Mauritius, still 2,905 km away — most of the planet's antipodes are ocean.
What’s near it
The closest other airport on this site is William P. Hobby (HOU), 38 km away in a straight line. It is the only one within 100 km.
Distances from IAH
Great circle distance and an estimated time in the air.
| To | Distance | Estimated | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sydney | SYD | 13,836 km | 17h 42m |
Where these facts come from
The profile is looked up, not written from memory: type, runways, elevation and the official website from OurAirports (public domain); opening year, namesake, operator and passenger count from Wikidata (CC0); the city centre from GeoNames (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.
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