Air New Zealand increased capacity on direct services between Auckland and Queenstown by a third over the summer season, including the addition of a fifth daily flight.
Travellers had a choice of direct services about every two hours and ''sales have been very strong in response to this'', Air NZ spokeswoman Brigitte Ransom, of Auckland, said.
The increase to five services a day as well as the increased use of larger A320 aircraft on some services previously operated by a Boeing 737 aircraft took the total number of seats on direct services over summer to more than 5000 each way a week.
''Queenstown is an important growth market for Air New Zealand, passenger demand continues to grow and we will continue to work towards meeting that passenger demand as more A320 aircraft are introduced to our fleet to replace the B737s,'' Ms Ransom said.
Queenstown continued to be a key destination for Jetstar because it was a year-round leisure resort which appealed to a wide range of travel markets.
Jetstar offered more than 10,000 domestic and international seats weekly to and from Queenstown.
Sydney-Queenstown operated three times a week, up from two a week, while Melbourne-Queenstown flew four times a week, previously three a week. The extra return flights were added in November last year.
The two new transtasman services operated on Saturdays, leaving Australia in the morning and arriving mid-afternoon. They boosted transtasman seats by 600 a week to 2000 a week on Jetstar.
The airline also offered connecting flights to Queenstown from Perth, the Gold Coast and Cairns.
Domestic services continued to be robust, Auckland-Queenstown flying 16 times a week and Wellington-Queenstown four times a week.
Jetstar spokesman Phil Boeyen, of Christchurch, said Jetstar services from both Melbourne and Sydney to Queenstown performed well over the summer season, including the additional flights added late last year.
The Qantas subsidiary did not have plans to add further capacity, or to reinstate the suspended Queenstown-Christchurch service, ''but, as always, we monitor the market for potential opportunities'', Mr Boeyen said.
International passengers at Queenstown Airport increased 16.7% in February, compared with the same month in 2012. The rise was partly due to the increase in schedule of Virgin Australia.
Domestic passenger numbers grew 5.6% for the month versus the same period last year.
The airport corporation said loadings were strong across the airlines.
The number of passengers increased 7.2% for February against February 2012. The number of passengers for the ''rolling 12 months'' increased 18.3% over the previous corresponding period.
There were 18 corporate jet landings in February, above the monthly average.
