Ranked: The 25 Safest Airlines In The World, According To AirlineRatings.com

What are the safest airlines in the world for 2024? As travelers gear up for another year of adventure and business, this question is top of mind. AirlineRatings.com, an airline safety and product rating review site, has the answer in its new ranking of the 25 safest airlines in the world.

AirlineRatings.com rates the safety and in-flight product of 385 airlines using its own unique seven-star rating system. In making its evaluation, the site considers a comprehensive range of factors, including serious incidents, recent fatal accidents, audits from aviation’s governing and industry bodies, industry-leading safety initiatives, expert pilot training assessment, fleet age and more. However, the evaluation leaves out such things that airlines have no control over, such as bird strikes, turbulence injuries, weather diversions and lightning strikes.

In past years, the site issued a list of the top 20 airlines; this year, it expanded the list to 25 of the largest and best-known carriers. “This year we went for a top 25 because the margins were so small between these airlines,” Geoffrey Thomas, the editor-in-chief of AirlineRatings.com, told me in an interview.

Capturing the top spot for 2024 is Air New Zealand, which edged out the competition, setting a new benchmark in airline safety and operational excellence. Air New Zealand also won in 2022. “Air New Zealand operates in some of the most challenging weather environments which test pilot skills,” says Thomas. “Wellington is one of the most windy airports in the world, while Queenstown is a huge navigation challenge.”

Another hallmark of Air New Zealand: “The airline has focused on the latest technology and its aircraft are state of the art in that respect,” says Thomas.

Coming in second on the list is Qantas, which won in 2023—though, according to Thomas, the safety margin was very small between Air New Zealand and Qantas. “Between Air New Zealand and Qantas there is only 1.5 points—it’s incredibly close,” says Thomas.

What pulled Qantas down: “Qantas slipped on fleet age, which the airline will address in 2024 with new fleets arriving,” says Thomas.

International carriers dominate the list of safest airlines. When it comes to U.S. carriers, only one is on the top 10 list: Alaska Airlines, which comes in number 10. (The airline slipped two points from 2023, when it ranked number eight). Hawaiian Airlines ranks number 21—a big drop from 2023 when it was number 12. American Airlines ranks number 22 (down from number 19 in 2023) and United Airlines ranks number 25 (down from number 14 in 2023).

“The U.S. carriers rankings are dragged down by the fleet age of their aircraft, however all have major replacement programs in place but it will take time for that to reflect in the rankings,” says Thomas.

And as he points out: “The rankings of all airlines include incidents against flights and fleet age. However the scoring was very tight.”

When it comes to the low-cost carriers, Jetstar—an Australian airline owned by Qantas—comes in number one. The top-ranking low-cost U.S. carrier is Frontier, which ranks number six beating out Southwest (at number nine), Sun Country (at number 14) and Spirit (number 15) and JetBlue (number 17).

Scroll down to see both lists: the world’s top 25 safest airlines and the safest low-cost airlines.