If you’ve never heard of The Points Guy, it’s an organization that “has been publishing hands-on travel advice–how to maximize any trip–since the site debuted in June of 2010.” The website shares news, reviews, guides, and videos that draw more than five million visitors each month. In this blog, our EWR Airport parking company shares the latest rankings of America’s main airlines:
The Standings
Here are the U.S.’s nine major airlines ranked from best to worst:
- Alaska Airlines
- Southwest Airlines
- Delta Air Lines
- United Airlines
- Frontier Airlines
- American Airlines
- Spirit Airlines
- JetBlue Airways
- Hawaiian Airlines
Categories
Each airline was evaluated in a number of categories using public data that included statistics from the Department of Transportation. The categories (along with the worst and best airline in each) are as follows:
Price
Airfare: Best: Spirit Airlines, Worst: Hawaiian Airlines
Baggage/Change Fees: Best: Southwest Airlines, Worst: Spirit Airlines
Convenience
Size of Route Network: Best: Southwest Airlines, Worst: Hawaiian Airlines
On-Time Arrivals: Best: Hawaiian Airlines, Worst: JetBlue Airways
Cabin Comfort: Best: Alaska Airlines, Worst: Spirit Airlines
Headaches
Customer Satisfaction: Best: Southwest Airlines, Worst: Spirit Airlines
Mishandled Baggage: Best: Spirit Airlines, Worst: American Airlines
Passengers Bumped: Best: Delta Air Lines, Worst: Spirit Airlines
Other
Frequent Flyer Program: Best: Alaska Airlines, Worst: Spirit Airlines
Lounges: Best: Delta Air Lines, Worst: Southwest Airlines, Spirit Airlines, Frontier Airlines, JetBlue Airways (all tied)
From the Founder…
In an article by Forbes, writer Laura Begley Bloom chatted with The Points Guy founder Brian Kelly about the rankings. A few responses that we found interesting include:
On why Allegiant and Sun Country weren’t on this year’s list: “As we did last year, we covered the largest U.S. airlines by passenger traffic. We wanted to include both Allegiant and Sun Country, but it was not possible to obtain enough data to accurately rank those two airlines. However, Allegiant has grown large enough that it was directed to begin reporting additional data to the Department of Transportation and other federal agencies starting this past January, so we expect to include Allegiant in our list of airlines next year.”
On why Alaska Airlines was ranked the best airline two years in a row: “The key to Alaska’s success isn’t that it does just one thing well, but that it does a lot of things well. The airline scored in the top three across half of our criteria — airfare, on-time arrivals, baggage handling, customer satisfaction and its best-in-the-industry frequent flyer program — and has yet to show any ill effects from its merger with Virgin America. The fact that Virgin itself was a highly-ranked airline (it finished third in last year’s study) also means it isn’t weighing down Alaska’s results.”
On why Hawaiian Airlines was ranked worst this year: “The primary reason is that our study puts a lot of weight on both airfare and the size of an airline’s route network, and Hawaiian doesn’t do well in either of those areas. Some might argue it’s not fair to penalize an airline for the fact that it’s focused on a specific region, but Alaska Airlines has grown far outside of Alaska and, while not having anywhere near the size of its larger competitors, still made the top spot in our study.”