Posted by: Alina Comoreanu

Traveling by plane costs an average of $370 per trip. And choosing the wrong airline has the potential to take even more from us. For instance, 26 animals died during air transportation in 2016, and seven major U.S. airlines had at least one pet fatality.

While critical to consider, such factors often fly under the radar due to our focus on price. But finding the cheapest airfare is now quite easy for anyone with an internet connection. So this report centers on those other, overlooked aspects of air travel to help consumers make more-informed decisions.

WalletHub compared the 10 largest U.S. airlines, plus two regional carriers, in 13 important categories. They range from cancellation and delay rates to baggage mishaps and in-flight comfort. And while this report focuses on non-price aspects of the flying experience, costs were considered in relation to in-flight amenities for the sake of fairness. For example, it wouldn’t be right to penalize an airline that charges for drinks, when its tickets are far cheaper than an airline offering free in-flight refreshments.

1. Best Airlines
2. Key Findings
3. Detailed Scores
4. Methodology

Best Airlines

2017's Best Airlines

Rank	Airline
1	Alaska Airlines
2	Virgin America
3	JetBlue Airways
4	Hawaiian Airlines
5	Delta Air Lines

Below, you can see where each major airline ranks, based on overall WalletHub Score, and how its performance changed year over year.

 

Key Findings

Most Reliable Airline … Alaska Airlines has the lowest rate of cancelations, delays, mishandled luggage and denied boardings.

 

Most Comfortable Airline … JetBlue leads the pack in terms of in-flight experience, offering free amenities such as Wi-Fi, extra legroom, and complimentary snacks and beverages.

 

* The regional carriers SkyWest and ExpressJet are not represented in the chart because they serve other major airlines, which may dictate what amenities are provided.

Cheapest Airline … Spirit and Frontier are the best airlines for budget flyers

 

*Reflects passenger revenue per available seat mile (PRASM),obtained by dividing passenger revenue by the product of the number of available seats, and the number of miles flown.

Best Airline for Pets … 1.3 animals died, got injured or were lost for every 10,000 transported by major U.S. airlines in 2016. None were incident-free.

 

*The following airlines are not represented in the chart, as they do not transport animals: Frontier, JetBlue, Southwest, Spirit, Virgin America

Most Satisfactory Airline … Southwest Airlines had the lowest consumer-complaint rate in the industry in 2016, while Frontier and Spirit had the highest complaint rates by far.

 

Detailed Scores

The tables below illustrate the number of points that each airline received based on the scoring system defined in the methodology.

National Airline Scores

Metric	Max Score	American Airlines	Delta Air Lines	Southwest Airlines	United Airlines	JetBlue Airways	Alaska Airlines	Spirit Airlines	Frontier Airlines	Hawaiian Airlines	Virgin America
Cancelled Flights	10	5.81	7.48	4.98	6.78	6.36	8.09	3.01	6.77	8.52	5.32
Delays	20	3.32	9.28	1.36	5.03	0.00	12.31	7.33	0.24	9.88	0.99
Mishandled Baggage Reports	10	3.59	7.08	4.48	5.32	7.53	7.46	6.30	2.59	5.19	8.82
Denied Boardings	10	9.36	9.90	9.01	9.57	9.08	9.60	9.42	9.42	9.95	9.88
Complaints	15	13.51	15.00	15.00	13.73	15.00	15.00	9.26	10.06	14.84	14.15
Animal Losses Reported	3	3.00	3.00	3.00	3.00	3.00	3.00	3.00	3.00	3.00	3.00
Animal Injuries Reported	6	0.00	0.00	6.00	0.00	6.00	0.00	6.00	6.00	6.00	6.00
Animal Deaths Reported	6	0.00	0.00	6.00	0.00	6.00	0.00	6.00	6.00	0.00	6.00
Leg Room	4	4.00	4.00	4.00	4.00	4.00	4.00	0.00	0.00	0.00	4.00
Entertainment Options	2	2.00	2.00	2.00	2.00	2.00	2.00	0.00	0.00	2.00	2.00
Wi-Fi Availability	2	1.00	1.00	1.00	1.00	2.00	1.00	0.00	0.00	0.00	1.00
Complimentary Refreshments	2	2.00	2.00	2.00	2.00	2.00	2.00	0.00	0.00	2.00	1.00
Price	10	4.29	3.81	3.63	4.46	4.73	5.39	9.87	9.01	4.26	5.80
Final Score	100	51.88	64.56	62.46	56.89	67.70	69.86	60.20	53.09	65.64	67.96

 

Regional Airline Scores (1)

Metric	Max Score	SkyWest Airlines	ExpressJet Airlines
Mainly Serves	N/A	American, Delta, Alaska and United	American, Delta and United
Cancelled Flights	10	9.23	4.97
Delays	20	5.59 (4)	3.43
Mishandled Baggage Reports (2)	10	3.64	1.53
Denied Boardings (2)	10	9.02	8.49
Complaints	15	15.00	15.00
Animal Losses Reported	3	3.00	3.00
Animal Injuries Reported	6	0.00	6.00
Animal Deaths Reported	6	0.00	0.00
Leg Room	4	4.00	4.00
Entertainment Options (3)	2	0.00	0.00
Wi-Fi Availability (3)	2	0.00	0.00
Complimentary Refreshments(3)	2	0.00	0.00
Price	10	6.38	7.62
Final Score	100	58.86	57.04

(1) Regional airlines that serve other major airlines. (2) As a regional airline ExpressJet does not control baggage handling or bookings. These are handled by the main airline served. (3) Depending on the major airline served, flights from this airline may or may not provide the service. Please see Methodology for scoring. (4) There may be discrepancies caused by variations in how airlines code their delay data that is reported to DOT. As a note, these regional carriers are not the only ones serving the national airlines, but the only ones that are required to report to the DoT.

Methodology

In this report, we sought to supplement easily accessible price-comparison tools by identifying the best and worst airlines in terms of overall service quality and functional performance. To this end, we evaluated the 10 largest national airlines as well as two regional carriers (that report to the Department of Transportation because they have at least 1 percent of total domestic scheduled-service passenger revenues) in terms of 13 key metrics across three major categories: 1) Baggage, departures and complaints, 2) Animal incidents and 3) In-flight comfort and cost.

After collecting and analyzing 2016 flight data from the U.S. Department of Transportation, we shared our findings with each airline. Two of them – namely, Delta and United– either did not meet our deadline for input or did not provide any feedback.

You can find the detailed scoring framework used to evaluate each airline below. Each metric within this framework was assigned a given weight based on our subjective view of its importance and we also determined the best and worst value within each metric. Points were generally allocated based on common sense, with the best value for each metric being awarded full points, the worst value receiving zero points and values in between receiving a proportional score relative to those endpoints. Certain metrics – such an animal deaths reported – were binary, with either full points or no points being allocated, given our belief that no middle ground exists.

1. Baggage, Departures & Complaints (Total Score: 65 points)  
   • a. Cancelled Flights (Max Score: 10 points, Best = 0.00%, Worst = 1.00%)

   • We collected the number of reported flight cancellations by each airline, then excluded any weather, security, and National Aviation System related cancellations, as they are not carrier-specific. We then divided the resulting figure by the corresponding number of regularly scheduled flights (excluding uncontrollable causes) to obtain the overall percentage of cancelled flights.

   • b. Delays (Max Score: 20 points, Best = 1.00%, Worst = 15.00%)

   • We identified the number of each airline’s flights that were delayed by more than 15 minutes, excluded weather, security and National Aviation System related delays, and divided the resulting figure by the total number of regularly scheduled flights (excluding uncontrollable causes) to obtain each airline’s delayed-flight percentage.

   • c. Mishandled Baggage Reports (Max Score: 10 points, Best = 0.50, Worst = 5.00)

   • We used the total number of mishandled (i.e. lost, damaged, delayed or pilfered) baggage reports received by each airline to determine the rate of mishandled baggage per 1,000 enplaned passengers.

   • d. Denied Boardings (Max Score: 10 points, Best = 0.00, Worst = 10.00)

   • We determined how many passengers with confirmed reservations were involuntarily denied boarding oversold flights on each airline. We then used this number to arrive at the rate of involuntary denied boardings per 10,000 passengers for each airline.

   • e. Complaints (Max Score: 15 points, Best = 1.00, Worst = 16.00)

   • We collected the total number of complaints filed against each airline. We then used this number to arrive at rate of complaints per 100,000 passengers.

2. Animal Related Incidents (Total Score: 15 points)  
   • a. Animal Losses Reported (Max Score: 3 points)
   • • If the airline did not report any incident regarding animal losses = Full Points
     • If the airline reported at least one incident regarding animal losses = No points
   • b. Animal Injuries Reported (Max Score: 6 points)
   • • If the airline did not report any incident regarding animal injuries = Full Points
     • If the airline reported at least one incident regarding animal injuries = No points
   • c. Animal Deaths Reported (Max Score: 6 points)
   • • If the airline did not report any incident regarding animal deaths = Full Points
     • If the airline reported at least one incident regarding animal deaths = No points
3. In-Flight Comfort And Cost (Total Score: 20 points)
   •  
   • a. Leg Room (Max Score: 4 points)
   • • If all an airline’s flights provide at least 30 inches of leg room in economy class/coach seats = Full points
     • If all of an airline’s flights do not provide at least 30 inches of leg room in economy class/coach seats = No points
   • b. Entertainment Options (Max Score: 2 points)
   • • If the airline provides some form of entertainment option (e.g. movies or live TV ) on most of its flights = Full points
     • If the airline does not provide entertainment options on any or most of the airlines in its fleet = No points
   • c. Wi-Fi Availability (Max Score: 2 points)
   • • If the airline provides free Wi-Fi on most of its flights= Full points
     • If the airline provides Wi-Fi for a cost on most of its flights = 1 point
     • If the airline does not provide Wi-Fi on most of its flights = No points
   • d. Complimentary Refreshments (Max Score: 2 points)
   • • If the airline provides both free food and drinks on all domestic flights over 2 hours = Full points
     • If the airline provides either free food or free drinks on all domestic flights over 2 hours = 1 point
     • If the airline does not provide free food or drinks on all domestic flights over 2 hours = No points
   • e. Price (Max Score: 10 points, Best = 5 cents, Worst = 17 cents)

   • We collected the values for “Passenger Revenue per ASM,” defined as passenger revenue divided by available seat miles, for each airline.

The regional airlines considered in this report – namely, SkyWest, ExpressJet – serve more than one major airline such as American, Delta, United and Alaska and may or may not offer certain services mentioned under in-flight comfort,” depending on the major airline served. In such cases, we used the average of the maximum and minimum potential scores for each situation to calculate the final score received. Data is accurate as of March 28 2017.

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