2023 Airline Rankings

The Airline Quality Rating (AQR) is the most comprehensive study of performance and quality of the largest airlines in the United States. The rating is a multifactor examination of the airlines based on mishandled baggage, consumer complaints, on-time performance and involuntary denied boardings.

The impact of the novel coronavirus on the U.S. domestic air travel passenger volume has all but disappeared. Passenger volume is back to pre-pandemic levels and system performance reflects the negative impact of this return to higher volumes of travelers. Each airline has been challenged to handle an uncertain situation and adapt its respective offerings to fast-changing circumstances. Some airlines adapted quicker than others and the AQR numbers give some insight into this adaptive timeline. The criterion that most affected the AQR performance scores in 2022 for all airlines is a dramatic increase in customer complaints. Most customer complaints in 2022 were for issues involving flight problems and refunds. Customer concern regarding refunds continued as a main concern from 2021 although at a lower level in 2022.

The mishandled baggage rate for the industry grew from 0.44 per 100 checked bags in 2021 to 0.56 per 100 checked bags in 2022 .
Denied boardings performance was noticeably worse in 2022 (0.42 per 10,000 passengers) than it was in 2021 (0.17 per 10,000 passengers).
The industry rate for customer complaints per 100,000 passengers increased from 4.51 in 2021 to 7.39 in 2022.

No airline improved their on-time arrival performance in 2022. On-time for 2022 by the industry was 73.0% compared to 79.1% in 2021.

Compare with results from previous years