The best and worst airports of 2023, according to AirHelp

• AirHelp, the world's largest air passenger rights organization, publishes the annual AirHelp Score, which ranks airports and airlines

• Airports are evaluated on punctuality, customer opinions and food & shops

• Montréal—Pierre Elliott Trudeau International Airport comes 182nd and Toronto Pearson International Airport 188th out of 194 airports ranked

Canada – 5 December 2023 – AirHelp, the world's largest air passenger rights organization, has today released the ratings of all airports and airlines around the world in its comprehensive AirHelp Score. Canadian airports in particular fared very poorly in this year’s ranking: of the 194 airports assessed, only five Canadian airports made it into this year’s ranking, with none making it any higher than 140th on the list.

Brazilian airports in second and fourth position

For the AirHelp Score, airports were evaluated in the categories of Punctuality, Customer Opinions and Food & Shops. With an overall score of 8.54 points, Muscat International Airport in Oman is in first place as the world’s leading airport. Whilst this airport is a new entry for 2023, it scored an average of 8.7 points across all categories. Recife/Guararapes–Gilberto Freyre International Airport in Brazil remains in second place this year with an overall score of 8.49, closely followed by South Africa’s Cape Town International Airport with 8.48 points.

A second Brazilian airport, Brasília–Presidente Juscelino Kubitschek International Airport, is in fourth place with 8.43 points and scored an impressive 8.6 points for flight punctuality. Finally, Doha Hamad International Airport in Qatar has risen by 32 positions this year to come in 5th place in the global ranking with 8.41 points.

Canadian airports have significant room for improvement

Of the five Canadian airports in the global ranking, Calgary International Airport is the best performer with an overall score of 7.17 points, appearing in 142nd place. The airport scored highest on customer opinion (7.8), followed by food and shops (7.7), and the lowest score was given to on-time performance (6.8). The two Canadian airports to feature at the bottom of this year’s global ranking were Montréal-Pierre Elliott Trudeau International Airport in 182nd place, and Toronto Pearson International Airport in 188th place. In both cases, these rankings were affected by poor on-time performance scores, with both airports dropping by 37 positions since 2022.

The best airports in the USA

Looking specifically at data for the United States reveals the best airport is Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport with 8.15 points, coming in at 13th place in the global ranking. Second place goes to Seattle-Tacoma International Airport with 7.96 points, ranking at 7.9 across the board when looking at punctuality, customer opinions and food & shops. Detroit Metropolitan Wayne County Airport is in third place with 7.91 points, ranking 38th on the global list this year.

The worst-performing airport in the United States is Newark Liberty International Airport, which is in 166th place with 6.95 points. This is a result of the airport scoring exceptionally low when looking at customer opinions, with only 6.6 points. This is closely followed by Fort Lauderdale Hollywood International Airport, with 6.98 points overall and dropping 118 positions compared to last year’s ranking.

Tomasz Pawliszyn, CEO of AirHelp commented: "Our goal at AirHelp is not only to educate passengers about their rights and help them enforce them in the event of flight disruptions, but also ensure they have an all-round satisfying flight experience. Over the past 10 years, we have helped 2 million passengers get paid compensation for delayed or canceled flights and in instances of denied boarding, while also collecting these never-seen-before statistics on airlines and airports. 

“The AirHelp Score uses data to rate airlines and airports across several factors, looking beyond only punctuality or customer feedback. This is because we know that passengers care about different things when they fly and we want the results of the AirHelp Score to reflect which airlines and airports offer the best overall passenger experience.” 

Find out more about AirHelp’s Best Airport Rankings Worldwide here. 

About the AirHelp Score

The AirHelp Score is a ranking of the best and worst airlines and airports in the world. AirHelp has been publishing the AirHelp Score since 2015 (with a break during the pandemic) to help passengers better plan their flights. The Score allows passengers to see what treatment they can expect from airlines and airports based on data. To calculate the AirHelp Score, multiple data sources and factors are combined to give passengers a comprehensive picture of how an airline or airport is performing. The airline score is based on three factors: on-time performance, customer opinions and complaint handling. These are weighted equally. The rating of airports is also based on three factors: punctuality, customer opinions, and food and business. Here, punctuality is the biggest factor at 60 percent. To determine the results, data from January 1 to September 30 was analyzed and passengers were asked about their most recently used airlines and airports.

About AirHelp

AirHelp is the world’s largest air passenger rights organization. Since its founding in 2013, the company has helped travelers enforce compensation for delayed or canceled flights, as well as in the event of denied boarding. In addition, AirHelp takes legal and political action to strengthen the rights of air passengers further worldwide. More information about AirHelp can be found at: https://www.airhelp.com/en-ca/