Ranked: The Best And Worst Airlines In America In 2019

It's been another headline-making year in aviation, with airlines having passengers arrested, Boeing facing a major crisis after multiple crashes, a budget carrier stranding passengers after going out of business and pets dying on planes. With all eyes on the airlines, the personal-finance website Wallethub has just announced its fourth annual list of the best and worst airlines in America. In addition to comparing 12 U.S. carriers (including the nine largest airlines plus three regional ones), Wallethub also revealed the most reliable airline, the most comfortable airline, the best airline for pets, the least-complained-about airline and the safest airline. Compare this to 2018's best and worst airlines, which ranked the airlines based on a similar report.

For its 2019 list, Wallethub collected and analyzed 2018 flight data from the U.S. Department of Transportation and compiled the list using a strategic methodology that compared 15 key metrics across four major categories, including baggage, departures and complaints; animal incidents; in-flight comfort and cost; and safety.

"It's easy to rank airlines by cost. But we ranked the best airlines in terms of overall service quality and functional performance," says Wallethub analyst Jill Gonzalez. "We also shared our findings with the airlines prior to publishing them, to make sure all information collected was accurate."

Some airlines such as Allegiant or Sun Country were not included on the list because of their size, according to Gonzalez. "We evaluated the nine largest national airlines and three regional carriers that report to the Department of Transportation because they have at least 1% of total domestic scheduled service passenger revenues," says Gonzalez. "Any airline with less of a share typically won't have the same incident and accident report data, which would lead to data limitations and an incomplete ranking."

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Topping the list: Alaska Airlines , which had a score of 63.52 out of 100, thanks to high rankings in areas like complaints and delays. "Alaska Airlines came out on top in many categories," says Gonzalez. "For example, all of its flights provide at least 30 inches of legroom in economy class. The airline also provides some form of entertainment on most of its flights and free food and drinks on all domestic flights that are over two hours. Aside from in-flight comfort, the airline is very safe. It has no fatalities reported due to aircraft-related issues, and the average fleet age is under ten years old."

The worst airline on the list was Frontier Airlines, which had a score of just 30.42. "Frontier has the highest share of canceled flights and the largest number of involuntary denied boardings," says Gonzalez. "Additionally, the airline has the highest number of aviation incidents and accidents per total number of flight operations."

In terms of other key findings, Delta Air Lines was named the most reliable airline, with the lowest rate of cancellations, delays, mishandled luggage and denied boardings. The least reliable was Frontier Airlines.

JetBlue was named the most comfortable airline, thanks to things like free Wi-Fi, extra legroom and complimentary snacks and beverages. The least comfortable: Spirit Airlines.

For the most pet-friendly airline, two carriers airlines tied: ExpressJet and Envoy. The least pet-friendly was Delta Air Lines.

The airline with the lowest consumer complaint rate was Southwest Airlines, while Frontier had the  most consumer complaints.

The safest airline in America was Alaska Airlines. The least safe: Southwest

The cheapest airline was Frontier Airlines, though in this case cheaper is not necessarily better, given that Frontier Airlines also ranked worst overall. The most expensive was Envoy Air.

Read on for the overall list of the best and worst airlines in America.

Overall Rankings: The Best And Worst Airlines

Here are the results, ranked from best to worst.

1. Alaska Airlines
2. Delta Air Lines
3. SkyWest Airlines
4. Spirit Airlines
5. ExpressJet Airlines
6. Hawaiian Airlines
7. United Airlines
8. JetBlue
9. Southwest Airlines
10. American Airlines
11. Envoy Air
12. Frontier Airlines

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