The airport was opened to commercial traffic on 11 July 1935. Though planned as a commercial airport, its importance to the military increased dramatically during the Third Reich. During World War II it was exclusively used for military purposes. An airlift between the airport and Breslau (modern day Wroc?aw) was established to support German troops during the Siege of Breslau in the spring of 1945. Attempts to destroy buildings and equipment before Allied troops could occupy Dresden failed due to the resistance of civilian airport employees. During the following years, the airport was used as an education centre for the Soviet army. It was reopened for commercial traffic on 16 June 1957. In 1959 international air traffic resumed, primarily to Eastern Bloc countries. Between 1955 and 1961, the East German government decided to develop its own aviation industry centred on Dresden, with the VEB Flugzeugwerke Dresden ("Publicly-owned Aircraft Factories Dresden") as the main plant. Although this development ultimately failed, it increased the importance of Klotzsche Airport considerably, and still shapes the design and atmosphere of the airport today. With the end of aircraft manufacturing in 1961, the plant became the VEB Flugzeugwerft Dresden ("Publicly-owned Aircraft Maintenance Dresden"), a maintenance facility for Eastern Bloc fighter aircraft and helicopters. From 1963, the airport was also home of an East German military transport squadron with Ilyushin Il-14 and later Antonov An-26, designated as Transportfliegerstaffel 27 (TFS-27) and later Transportfliegerstaffel 24 (TFS-24, TS-24). Passenger traffic was limited to domestic routes and to a few destinations in other Eastern Bloc countries. After German reunification, the airport was expanded and flights to western European capitals were added. Traffic increased sevenfold during the first half of the 1990s and a second terminal was opened in 1995. In 2001 the current terminal was added. It was rebuilt from a hangar formerly used as an assembly hall by the aircraft industry. In 2008, 1,860,364 passengers passed through the airport, an increase of 0.3% over the previous year and a record for the airport. In the same year, there were 36,968 takeoffs and landings, an increase of 2.3% over the previous year. The airport rebranded itself as "Dresden International" in September of the same year. In February 2015, Etihad Regional terminated of all their Dresden operations (which had commenced only two years earlier) due to changes to their strategy. All three existing routes were shut down, while two planned routes were never started. In June 2015, CityJet announced the termination of their route from London City Airport to Dresden after two years, citing low demand. After the demise of Germania in early 2019, Sundair announced they would base aircraft in Dresden and fly to several former Germania leisure destinations. In October 2024 Ryanair announced the termination of all routes at three German airports including Dresden, citing high operational costs.