I can’t say that I generally respect Skytrax much, but the company has just published its annual airline awards, which does tend to get a lot of media attention. So I’d like to take a look at that, as the incumbent airline didn’t win.
Singapore Airlines ranked best airline in the world
Skytrax has published the results of its annual World Airline Awards. While there are awards across a variety of areas, the most coveted is of course getting the title of “World’s Best Airline.” For 2026, here are the top 10 winners:
- Singapore Airlines
- Qatar Airways
- Cathay Pacific
- All Nippon Airways
- Turkish Airlines
- Emirates
- Air France
- Hainan Airlines
- Japan Airlines
- Korean Air
For those curious, here’s how this compared to the 2025 results:
- Qatar Airways
- Singapore Airlines
- Cathay Pacific
- Emirates
- All Nippon Airways
- Turkish Airlines
- Korean Air
- Air France
- Japan Airlines
- Hainan Airlines
As you can see, the top 10 airlines remained the same compared to last year, it’s just the order that has changed.
Lastly, for those curious about which airline won the first place spot for the last 15 years (the awards didn’t take place in 2020, due to the pandemic):
- Qatar Airways won the award nine times, in 2011, 2012, 2015, 2017, 2019, 2021, 2022, 2024, and 2025
- Singapore Airlines won the award three times, in 2018, 2023, and 2026
- Emirates won the award two times, in 2013 and 2016
- Cathay Pacific won the award one time, in 2014
The methodology used for the Skytrax World Airline Awards
To Skytrax’s credit, the World Airline Awards have some legitimacy, in the sense that the company is relatively transparent about how this is awarded. This isn’t based on the choice of some expert panel, or anything. Instead, the public can vote on various aspects of their experience when flying with airlines around the world, and that’s how the results are determined.
So over the course of the past 12 months, people have been able to vote on which airline they think is best, and that’s what determines the winners. The company does note that it applies weighting for airline sizes, to provide equity when evaluating carriers of different sizes, by using passenger numbers.
With that in mind, it’s not surprising to see that Singapore Airlines beat Qatar Airways this year. Both are world class airlines, but with the ongoing war and impact that had on operations earlier this year, it’s logical this had an impact on passenger perception.
This award concept is all a lot more transparent than the system by which Skytrax awards its star ratings, especially given that the company also does consulting for airlines. Just keep in mind how in 2017, Lufthansa was awarded a Skytrax 5-star rating, and that was given less than two weeks after the airline unveiled its Allegris business class (lol at the past decade). This is when any of Skytrax’s remaining credibility went out the window.
At the time, Skytrax’s CEO explained the following was a key reason that Lufthansa received a 5-star rating:
“A key factor behind Lufthansa gaining 5-Star Airline Certification is the recently announced new business class cabin and seat that will be delivered when the airline receives their first Boeing 777X aircraft.”
Yet at the time, Skytrax also stated that the following was how star ratings were determined:
“The consistency of an airline’s Product and service is a critical issue within their final Rating, and detailed focus is applied to the delivered realities. Particular attention is applied to the quality and consistency of cabin seating, IFE systems and associated cabin products. An airline offering less than 80% fleet-wide product consistency may find these conditions will have a negative impact on their final quality rating determination.”
So consistency is important, and any airline with less than 80% consistency could find that that those conditions lead to a negative impact on the final score. But Lufthansa got a 5-star rating, with one consideration being a product it hadn’t actually yet introduced?
Bottom line
Skytrax’s World Airline Awards have just been published for 2026, and Singapore Airlines has stolen the top spot from Qatar Airways. While these are the two most awarded airlines, Qatar Airways has won the award more often than Singapore Airlines has.
Unlike the Skytrax star rating system, the World Airline Awards are actually based on passenger surveys, so it’s not surprising to me that Qatar Airways may have had a rougher than usual year, given operational irregularities.
What do you make of the World Airline Awards and the results this year?
Cathay Pacific: world's most elusive award seat
Personally, I wasn’t impressed with SQ either. While I didn’t try their premium cabins (yet), in Economy it just felt like they did their textbook service and then went hiding into the galley. Akin to a domestic AA flight.
My contender for best airline across all cabins would be EY, EK, or QR. Haven’t flown JL, JX, or CX to compare them.
I feel that these awards just aren’t useful. It’s only really meant for publicity so that people can be incentivized to choose one airline over another. I feel greater value comes from reviewers and also YouTubers. Simply Aviation is personally my favorite YouTuber, tho I also enjoy watching Jeb Brooks, probably more for entertainment purposes than being scientific but he’s honest and humble when he does review things which I like a lot.
Wonder what Qatar got for their hissy fit a few weeks ago. You wouldn't know anything was wrong based on the Qatar press release. Maybe they pulled strings so that Oneworld could win best alliance? Star Alliance had won that one for the last 5 years or so?
Who knows. Palace intrigue that has the importance of, well, absolutely nothing.
Ryanair one spot ahead of American is somewhat funny... I guess Ben would recommend switching CEOs? ;)
It's interesting to see how many well-known airlines managed to even get behind Air India. And some people might say that TUI Airways would get a higher ranking by ditching Go2Sky.
American got #4 most improved airline for 2026! Right behind EgyptAir, Air India and Royal Jordanian. I can only assume that's the next headline on this site - would make for an amusing comments section at least.
This is some poor reporting from you, didn't you just do an article last month on a related topic, and no reference or expounding on it? It seems highly correlated that the supposed "beef" between QR and Skytrax is linked to them being dethroned, no?
"Qatar Airways & Skytrax Have Beef: “World’s Best Airline” No More?"
@ yoloswag420 -- I'm not sure how that's poor reporting? Yes, I theorized the airline would lose its ranking of being number one in the world. I didn't feel the need to say "see, I was right," since I'm not sure what that accomplishes?
To play Devil's advocate, not having Allegris in any of their planes is (technically) consistent 😉
@ studentFlyer -- Hah!
Skytrax is a joke. And these rankings are a joke.
Singapore has been chipping away at its excellence. Last trip I had with them they didn't provide an amenity kit nor did they provide pajamas. The pre-ordered food was much less in quantity and quality then it used to be, the quality of wine and spirits was very ordinary. Their business class lounge would struggle to even get in the Top 10 business class...
Skytrax is a joke. And these rankings are a joke.
Singapore has been chipping away at its excellence. Last trip I had with them they didn't provide an amenity kit nor did they provide pajamas. The pre-ordered food was much less in quantity and quality then it used to be, the quality of wine and spirits was very ordinary. Their business class lounge would struggle to even get in the Top 10 business class lounges in the world. But somehow it's the best airline in the world.
@ BBT -- Respectfully, I'm not sure how that would be chipping away at their excellence? Back in the day, the airline didn't have amenity kits at all, and the carrier hasn't historically had pajamas (though is expected to add them soon). So I understand those are areas where you feel the airline may have fell short, but that has been the status quo at the airline for a long time.
Only one North American airline in the Top 20, and that's Air Canada. I can feel a disturbance in the Force.