Ryanair carried a record 20.7 million passengers in July.

New figures from the airline show that passenger numbers were up 3% on the same month last year, when 20.2 million passengers were recorded.

Ryanair operated over 113,000 flights last month, while 680 flights were cancelled mainly due to French air traffic control strikes.

During the month, the airline's load factor - the average proportion of seats filled on each flight - was 96%.

That's on a par with its load factor for the same month last year.

On a rolling basis, Ryanair carried 203.1m passengers in the year to the end of July, up 7% on the same period last year.

The news comes just a couple of weeks after Ryanair surpassed expectations as it reported profits of over €800m in the first quarter.

The airline confirmed that its net profits more than doubled in its April-June quarter.

This was, they said, as a result of the timing of the Easter holidays combined with better-than-expected last-minute fares.

Ryanair reported a net profit of €820m for the first quarter, up from €360m in the same time last year when Easter was in March and ahead of the predicted figure of €716m.