AirlineRatings Releases Rankings of the World’s Safest Airlines

Air New Zealand Dreamliner in flight

The world’s only airline product and safety rating website, AirlineRatings.com, has just released its annual roster of the world’s safest airlines for 2024, with some noteworthy shifts emerging in its findings.

Once again securing the top spot this year is Kiwi carrier Air New Zealand, which only outshone its near neighbor, Qantas, by a small margin.

Qantas actually ranked first last year, having dethroned Air New Zealand, which topped the list of 385 global airlines that AirlineRatings.com monitors in 2022. But, this year, the Australian flag carrier was bumped back down to second place by just 1.5 points in the ranking, with the age of its fleet being the factor that tipped the scales.

However, Qantas is already in the midst of the biggest fleet renewal in its history, with massive orders of updated A220, A320, A321, A350 and 787 aircraft on order and scheduled for delivery over the next three years.

More foreign carriers constituted nine of the top ten, with Virgin Australia, Etihad Airways, Qatar Airways, Emirates, All Nippon Airways, Finnair and Cathay Pacific Airways trailing the top two Oceanian airlines. U.S.-based Alaska Airlines was the only American carrier to make it into the top ten. Three more U.S. airlines appear in the top 25 list: Hawaiian Airlines, American Airlines and United Airlines.

According to AirlineRatings.com Editor-in-Chief, Geoffrey Thomas, when it came to research methodology, the website’s analysts scrutinized global carriers based on a range of factors. These included any crashes occurring over the past five years, any serious incidents in the past two years, various audits conducted by governments or aviation bodies, the average age of aircraft within a carrier’s fleet and its crew training standards.

Thomas pointed out that, when it comes to topic of airline safety incidents, they occur to some degree with every carrier on a daily basis, and that many involve equipment concerns, such as issues with aircraft or engine manufacture, rather than being operational problems within the airlines’ control. “It is the way the flight crew handles these serious incidents that determines a good airline from an unsafe one,” Thomas noted.

Commenting on the caliber of these leading airlines, Thomas said, “Our top 25 safest airlines 2024 are always at the forefront of safety innovation, operational excellence, and the launching of new more advanced aircraft, such as the Airbus A350 Boeing 787 and 777-9.” He added, “Airlines such as Emirates launched the 777-300ER and the 777-9, and are the biggest operators of the A380.”

The top 25 safest global airlines for 2024:

1. Air New Zealand
2. Qantas
3. Virgin Australia
4. Etihad Airways
5. Qatar Airways
6. Emirates
7. All Nippon Airways
8. Finnair
9. Cathay Pacific Airways
10. Alaska Airlines
11. SAS
12. Korean Air
13. Singapore Airlines
14. EVA Air
15. British Airways
16. Turkish Airlines
17. TAP Air Portugal
18. Lufthansa/Swiss Group
19. KLM
20. Japan Airlines
21. Hawaiian Airlines
22. American Airlines
23. Air France
24. Air Canada Group
25. United Airlines