easyJet or Jet2: which package holiday group is flying highest?

easyJet, by a clear margin on every measure of size. Turnover of £10,106m in the year to September 2025 is 1.4 times the £7,174m Jet2 filed for the year to March 2025, a gap of £2,932m. Headcount follows the same shape, 18,968 against 15,205, and net assets are more than double, £3,498m against £1,612m.

Direction of travel favours the smaller group. Jet2 grew turnover by 14.7 per cent while easyJet grew by 8.6 per cent, and Jet2 added staff slightly faster, 8.2 per cent against 7.5 per cent. Profit moved the same way, easyJet's estimated £658m up from £602m the year before, Jet2's £593m up from £530m, growth of 9.3 per cent and 11.9 per cent respectively.

The corporate ages are 23 years apart. Jet2 plc was incorporated in 1977, easyJet plc in 2000, which is a reminder that the Leeds business reached package holidays through a longer route than its incorporation date for the airline alone would suggest.

Jet2, by 1.8 percentage points. It converts 8.3 per cent of turnover into profit before tax against easyJet's 6.5 per cent, which is the difference between the two groups' whole shapes rather than a rounding effect. Per employee the ranking flips as well: Jet2 delivers about £39,000 of profit before tax for every person on the payroll, easyJet about £34,700.

easyJet is the more productive on revenue per head, roughly £533,000 of turnover per employee against £472,000, but it also pays considerably more for that output. Average staff cost per head is £78,000 at easyJet and £55,000 at Jet2, and payroll absorbs 14.6 per cent of easyJet's turnover against 11.6 per cent of Jet2's. Two different mixes of crew, engineering, retail and head office sit behind those averages, so the gap describes cost structure rather than pay for any comparable role.

Because the two groups sit on opposite sides of the financing line. Jet2 files £179m of interest received against £58m payable, a net inflow of £121m. easyJet files £131m received against £157m payable, a net cost of £26m. On the profit line that swing is worth more than twice the £65m gap between the two groups' profits.

The balance sheets explain most of it. easyJet carries estimated borrowings of £2,920m against Jet2's £1,058m, 2.8 times as much, and holds net assets of £3,498m against £1,612m. Jet2's current assets of £3,707m sit against filed debtors of only £75m, the pattern of a business that collects from customers long before it pays suppliers.

Returns to shareholders follow the same split. easyJet declared dividends of £91m and Jet2 £32m, which is £0.90 and £0.45 respectively for every £100 of turnover.

Neither group has a controlling owner on the register. Both are listed public companies, and neither filing records a person with significant control, which is the normal position for a widely held plc: control sits with shareholders through the board rather than with an identifiable individual or parent. Neither company shows a 75 per cent direct owner in the filing data either, so nothing here points to a single dominant stake.

What the register does show is the board. easyJet plc carries 11 current officer appointments, among them Alistair Kenton Jarvis, appointed 2021, Stephen Alan Michael Hester, appointed 2021, and Catherine Bradley, appointed 2020, against 64 appointment records in total since incorporation. Jet2 plc carries 8 current appointments from 27 records, a much shorter register, including Stephen Paul Heapy, appointed 2013, Gary James Brown, appointed 2013, and Rachel Elizabeth Kentleton, appointed 2024.

Both companies file under the same SIC code, activities of head offices, and both file consolidated accounts, so each set of figures on this page already includes that group's own subsidiaries. Nothing has been added on top of either consolidated line.