United Airlines and American Airlines tied in a new ranking that examined on-time performance, customer opinions, and more.
According to a new study by AirHelp, both airlines scored a 8.04 in the company's overall ranking while United Airlines scored with a 7.8 rating for customer opinion and American Airlines followed with 7.5. Both had an 8.5 rating for processing claims.
The two U.S. airlines scored among global carriers where Brussels Airlines and Qatar Airlines were ranked No. 1 and No. 2, respectively.
“The 2024 AirHelp Score for airlines is designed to act as a snapshot of airline performance, evaluating each airline's strengths and areas for improvement,” Tomasz Pawliszyn, the CEO of AirHelp, said in a statement. “There is always scope for airlines to improve in the rankings each year, using the score to help guide them.”
Low-cost Icelandic airline Play took the No. 5 overall spot on the list with a total score of 7.89 and came in on top for on-time performance with a very high score of 9. The ranking comes as Play plans to scale back the number of North American destinations it flies to by mid-2025.
AirHelp lauded this year’s top carrier, Brussels Airlines, for its particularly high score of 8.7 when it comes to processing claims. The airline had an on-time performance score of 7.8 and a customer opinion score of 7.9.
The runner-up, Qatar Airways, had a very high customer opinion score of 8.9 and a high on-time performance score of 8.2, but fell a bit short in its claim processing score with only 7.3. Qatar is consistently rated one of the best airlines in the world and is known for its legendary business class Qsuites.
However, nearby United Arab Emirates-based airline Emirates had the highest customer opinion ranking with a score of 9.
No other U.S. airline made the top 10, but Delta Air Lines was next at No. 17 with both an on-time performance and customer opinion rating of 8.1, but a claim processing rating of just 5.7.