---
title: "NBO — Jomo Kenyatta Airport, Nairobi · Orbit"
description: "Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (NBO/HKJK) serves Nairobi, Kenya. Opened 1958, named after Jomo Kenyatta, 1.9 million passengers in 2021, 13 km from Nairobi."
url: https://orbitflights.app/airports/nbo
---

Nairobi · Kenya · Africa

# NBO — Jomo Kenyatta

Jomo Kenyatta International Airport serves Nairobi, Kenya, 13 km from the city centre, and sits at 1.3°S, 36.9°E. This site carries 5 routes touching it, with the great circle distance for each.

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

**ICAO**
HKJK
used by air traffic control

**Opened**
1958
per Wikidata

**Passengers**
1.9M
in 2021

## History & name

Jomo Kenyatta International Airport opened in 1958 and is named after Jomo Kenyatta, Prime Minister (1963 to 1964) and President (1964 to 1978) of self-governing Kenya. Operated by the Kenya Airports Authority, it lies 13 km from Nairobi and recorded 1.9 million passengers in 2021\. Its one runway is 4,117 m long, at 5,330 ft.

Named after **Jomo Kenyatta** — first Prime Minister (1963 to 1964) and President (1964 to 1978) of self-governing Kenya

Read more: [Wikipedia ↗](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jomo%5FKenyatta%5FInternational%5FAirport) · [Wikidata ↗](https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q206349)

## At a glance

**Full name**
Jomo Kenyatta International Airport

**Serves**
Nairobi, Kenya

**City centre**
13 km from Nairobi

**Opened**
1958

**Operator**
Kenya Airports Authority

**Passengers**
1.9 million in 2021

**Runways**
1 runway, 4,117 m

**Elevation**
5,330 ft (1,625 m)

**Map**
[Open in Google Maps ↗](https://www.google.com/maps/search/?api=1&query=-1.31890,36.92820)

**Website**
[kenyaairports.com ↗](https://www.kenyaairports.com/jkia/IndexJkia.php)

## Where it sits

1.3°S, 36.9°E puts NBO in the southern hemisphere, 147 km from the equator and 9,861 km from the South pole.

Of the 661 airports on this site it is the **521st** most northerly, which makes it the 141st most southerly.

## Straight through the middle

Straight down through the centre of the Earth comes out at 1.3°N, 143.1°W. The nearest airport on this site to that point is Fa'a'ā (PPT) in French Polynesia, still 2,217 km away — most of the planet's antipodes are ocean.

## What’s near it

The closest other airport on this site is **Kericho** (KEY), 214 km away in a straight line. Nothing else on this site is within 100 km.

## Distances from NBO

Great circle distance and an estimated time in the air. The longest is London, at 6,841 km.

| To                                                         |     | Distance | Estimated |
| ---------------------------------------------------------- | --- | -------- | --------- |
| [Zanzibar](https://orbitflights.app/routes/nbo-to-znz)     | ZNZ | 602 km   | 1h 15m    |
| [Addis Ababa](https://orbitflights.app/routes/nbo-to-add)  | ADD | 1,164 km | 1h 57m    |
| [Johannesburg](https://orbitflights.app/routes/jnb-to-nbo) | JNB | 2,912 km | 4h 07m    |
| [Dubai](https://orbitflights.app/routes/dxb-to-nbo)        | DXB | 3,559 km | 4h 55m    |
| [London](https://orbitflights.app/routes/lhr-to-nbo)       | LHR | 6,841 km | 9h 00m    |

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

## Flown through NBO?

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)

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