About Airline Star Rating

World Airline Star Rating

Skytrax World Airline Star Rating began in 1999, and is the prestigious, longest established and unique mark of Quality Achievement and a global benchmark of Airline Excellence, awarded following the professional audit analysis and assessment of airline product and front-line service standards.

Airline Star Ratings are awarded following detailed, professional analysis of an airline’s quality standards by the audit office. A typical rating of standards is based on analysis of between 500 and 800 product and service delivery assessment items. This covers airport services at the airline’s hub, and onboard standards across all applicable cabin / aircraft types.

The Ratings shown on this website show headline extracts of the key areas used in final assessment and grading. Airline Star Ratings are not associated with customer reviews, and are based on research and analysis by Skytrax Audit Office.

Skytrax Star Ratings are recognised as a global Benchmark of airline standards around the world, and use a quality scale from 1-Star through to the exclusive 5-Star Airline award. Ratings are based on evaluation of product and service standards for both the onboard and airport environments, using a unified and consistent rating system.

5-Star Airline Rating
Awarded to airlines achieving a very high, overall Quality performance. It recognises high standards of Airport and Onboard Product together with consistent and excellent standards of Staff Service delivery across the Airport and Cabin service environments.

4-Star Airline Rating
A seal of Quality Approval awarded to airlines that deliver a good overall Quality performance. The ranking represents airlines providing good Product standards across different travel cabins, and delivering good standards of Staff Service for the Onboard and home-base Airport environments.

3-Star Airline Rating
Awarded to airlines delivering a fair Quality performance equating to an industry “average” of acceptable product and service standards. This 3-Star rating signifies a satisfactory Product quality across different travel cabins. It is performing below 4-Star requirements due to inconsistency amongst either product and/or front-line Staff Service for the Onboard and home-base Airport environments.

2-Star Airline Rating
Shows airlines delivering a lower total Quality performance, in some instances below the industry average across many rating categories. A 2-Star Airline rating signifies an inconsistent or lower Quality of Product and/or front-line Staff Service for the Onboard and home-base Airport environments.

1-Star Airline Rating
This represents a poor quality of Product delivered across the assessment sectors, combining with low and/or inconsistent standards of front-line Staff Service for the Onboard and home-base Airport.

There are 3 airline rating types: Full Service Airline, Low-Cost Airline, Leisure Airline.

» FULL SERVICE AIRLINE RATING

Each airline is rated on the basis of it’s front-line product and service quality across the onboard and airport environments. A core assessment within Star Rating is the reality of “delivered” product and service supplied to customers. Airport rating is applied to prevailing standards at an airline’s “home base” operating airport.

» LOW-COST AIRLINE RATING

Low-Cost Airline rating is a specific system for grading these airline types. If a low-cost airline delivers very high standards of service, core low-cost product and quality consistency to customers, there is nothing to prevent it from achieving 5-Star Low-Cost Airline status. Rating topics for low-cost assessment take full account of different price levels, optional / extra items and relative value analysis of these.

» LEISURE AIRLINE RATING

Leisure airline rating again assesses all aspects of front-line product and service quality across the onboard and airport environments. Some variation applies to distinguish specific product inclusion that might apply only to leisure airlines.

Please visit the Frequently Asked Questions page for more details about our ratings.

Any airline requiring further information about the Star Rating can contact us through our Airline members page.

NOTE: Airline ratings shown on this website represent only a selected summary of assessment topics used to determine grading levels.