The Points Guy released its annual ranking of the Top 10 best airlines in the United States, and Delta ranks No. 1 for the fourth year in a row. Nick Ewen, director of content at The Points Guy, joined Cheddar News to explain why. “They were generally very reliable,” he said. “They did not involuntarily bump many passengers during the year at all. And they also have a really lucrative travel experience with their Sky Club lounges as well as their frequent flyer program. So it was really consistency across the board that pushed Delta into the top spot.” Check out the video to learn how Spirit, Allegiant, JetBlue and other airlines fared. 


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The Points Guy Ranks Delta as Nation’s No. 1 Airline

Okay, well, the airline industry has been in turmoil ever since the pandemic. But even though travelers are returning to the skies and airlines are starting to make money again, the struggles do remain in labor disputes and pilot shortage is causing cancelations delays emitted sudden jump in demand that we've seen throughout the summer. But summer serving passengers needs better than others and travel website, the points guys out with its annual ranking of the top 10 U. S. Airlines. So joining me now is nick you in director of content at the points guy? Nick. Thanks so much for coming on. I know Delta actually flying past the competition this year. What makes Delta the best drink airline? Well, thank you so much for having me. Delta actually took the top spot for the fourth year in a row. And this was a variety of different factors. They were generally very reliable. They did not involuntarily bumped many passengers during the year at all. And they also have a really lucrative travel experience with their Sky club lounges as well as their frequent flyer program. So it was really consistency across the board that pushed Delta into the top spot. Okay. Which airlines are not doing so well? We had a full screen up there. Nick Delta is on the good side of the coin. What is not performing in the way that passengers have hoped for? Well, all the airlines have had struggles, especially over the last few months. When we looked at all of this data though, we tried to look at it very comprehensively across a wide variety of different criteria and it really depends on what you're looking for if you want the most affordable airline, the one that's gonna get you the furthest at the lowest cost. Even though Spirit was last in the rankings, they were actually the most affordable. Uh, some of the airlines that were struggling american, even though they came in the top five, they were the worst at check bags over the previous year and Allegiant, which came in ninth. They were the worst in terms of flight delays and flight cancelations. So it really depends on what you're looking for. Each airline had both its positives as well as its negative. Well, let's talk about jet blue a little bit because I know this company, this airline wasn't a bidding war for Spirit. Frontier, competed with JetBlue for this deal with Spirit as well. JetBlue did actually fall a spot I see here in the rankings. Maybe we can pull that full screen back up. What wasn't working for JetBlue's performance this year versus last year. Well, JetBlue first and foremost, continues to excel in their onboard product, but where they struggled a little bit was with the timeliness. So JetBlue has actually had the second highest percentage of delayed flights over the last year and also was the second worst at handling mobility devices like wheelchairs and scooters and it had the second highest number of complaints filed with the Department of Transportation. So some of those operational concerns, you certainly hope that they are taking steps to address those. Of course we've seen just about every airline struggle in certain respects over the last several months. So it'll be interesting to see how the rankings next year shakeouts. How far ahead was Delta versus the number two best performing airline this past year. So we ranked all the airlines on a scale of 0 to 100 Delta scored about 10 points higher than the second place airline, which was Southwest Southwest just barely eked out the second place spot ahead of United. So there was a much closer score between the 2nd and 3rd place. Delta was really quite far ahead of the rest of the pack. You know, I'm kind of surprised actually to see Southwest performing that well as someone who used to travel on Southwest on a regular basis, let's say like eight years ago or so. I had cancelations all of the time. Nick. How how did Southwest cinch that number two spot. Well, there were a couple of ways that Southwest really stood out. One of the categories we looked at was those ancillary fees, your checked bag fees as well as your change and cancelation fees. Those are areas where Southwest doesn't impose those except for certain cases if you go beyond the free checked bag restrictions. So Southwest really excelled there. And then they also excelled in the award availability piece. Southwest has a revenue based frequent flyer program. So if there's a C available on the plane, you can redeem the rapid rewards points for it. Other airlines are not that friendly to frequent flyers trying to use their rewards. So those areas really helped Southwest edge into that second spot. Is there the expectation nick as someone who covers this very closely at the points Guy which covers travel in general that with the purchase, JetBlue's purchase of Spirit that that can actually improve its rankings over time, it really remains to be seen. I would think in the short term it probably won't have as much of an impact. Of course, the two are going to remain separate for many, many months if not years. There's still obviously a review that needs to happen before the merger is even finalized. But ultimately, the process of integrating to airlines, especially to airlines that have wildly different customer models in in terms of the ancillary fees charging for everything in an ala carte model versus JetBlue that provides so many things complimentary, I think it will potentially have some negative impacts initially. And only time will tell if they can work through some of those difficulties and create a better overall experience for customers in the long run. All right, nick you and Director of content at the points guy, Nick thanks so much for coming on