[4] Urumqi Airport was opened to foreign passengers in 1973,[5] and has been used for emergency landings for flights between Europe and west Asia.

[7] After the transformation of the T1 terminal has six security channels, 19 check-in counters, with the peak hourly 700 times the business capacity.

[11] It serves most domestic routes outside of Xinjiang province, except for China Southern, Xiamen and Chongqing Airlines flights.

An expansion project, which began in 2017, is underway and will see a new terminal building covering almost 400,000 sq meters consisting of 177 gates, as well as two additional runways north of the existing.

After the opening of T4, the previous three terminals will be converted to cargo relay stations as part of the Belt and Road Initiative.