What Is The Best Airline You Have Flown With?

Well SAS have removed the European buisness class and replaced it whit SAS Plus, basically economy class were you get everything that is in the menu for free and you have a flight attendant only for Plus passagers. Still Plus costs like buisness class and it is not worth flying whit sas but the new long haul buisness seat is something and that is truely worth it.

Been flying all major carriers in europe - but my best experience is by far LAN Chile. Great planes, great service.

Worst must be EasyJet.But it wasen’t really a suprise.

 

It's really hard to say which airline is the best. Service quality changes over the years and it's definitely a difference whether one flies short-haul or long-haul.

So - I would tend to respond to as which airline has surprised me most (in a positive way):

  1. LAN Chile: I did fly three times the route AKL-PPT-IPC-SCL, plus shorthaul routes within South America - and each time the service and staff was impeccable.
  2. Turkish Airlines: I grew up when this airline was synonymous for a very bad, third world, dilapidated aircraft kind of airline. Man, have they changed: Turkish Airlines is my favorite airline today with excellent service and staff and an extensive route network / schedule that fits most of the time my needs.
  3. Aeroflot: Another airline that suffers from a bad reputation (from the Soviet-era). Their service is surprisingly comparable to (in C-Class definitely better than) any major European airline (LH, LX, BA, AF, etc.) - but at a fraction of their price. Aeroflot's problem is their hub in Russia, where most Europeans need a visa. 

My best flight experience was LAX-AKL with Air New Zealand. Especially after a LH flight FRA-LAX in a very old 747 with hundreds of idiots. But this is 12 years back. Staff at Air New Zealand was also great, also on domestic flights.

Service: Turkish Airlines was excellent this year. Emirates for their flights to India and MUC (A380) but not for their HUB - Dubai is a nightmare for me. 

Kingfisher was great in the first few weeks with brand new planes and very good service on board.

With Swiss I also had very nice flights. Once they gave me an upgrade to business without any reason - the service was also great.

Thai Airways was awesome in the 90s.

Lufthansa on long-haul in Business is nice, especially to South Africa. But eco to India - a nightmare...

It is hard to name the best airline!

Probably delta because I flew on delta from MSP-DCA in a MD90 and we had a great captin. Also, he flew the river approach absolutly flawlessly and he gave us a play by play commentary all throughout the flight.

I just finished a return flight HKG-ZRH-HKG (via SVO) on Aeroflot in Business on their 777-300ER.

While I don't fly too much on business on long-haul flights, I must say that was a very good experience. Flights on time, very personal and attentive service (on all four legs), comfy, full-flat seats on the 777, a good IFE with recent movies/TV-shows and nice food selection with very generous alcoholic beverages.

For the price paid, I must say it's very hard to beat.

The airport in Moscow is a bit on the old side and feels a bit cramped (and no Visa needed at all for simple transfers). Aeroflot though has a new lounge which is quite a bit an improvement over their old one (yet still not top top). The transfer though is seamless and within 5 minutes you can make it from one aircraft to the other (as the distances are short on International travels). I'd choose them anytime again with pleasure.

I'm happy with Lufthansa. I flew with them from Copenhagen to Orlando two years ago. The meals were pretty good, I got free drinks during the whole flight, no turbulence and the flight was nearly on time. And all of that for only around 700 dollars to and from Orlando International. So I guess I have to say Lufthansa is the airline for me.

Norweigan are really good as well as Lufthansa 

Aeroflot is a great carrier and gets alot of rubbish thrown at it which it does not deserve. Norwegian is also great especially for short haul with great wifi with a decent speed. For long haul I really like their premium which is what one would expect in Premium Economy though nothing close to business it is only disappointing not to have wifi. My next Norwegian flight is on Christmas eve heading to FLL for a couple of days in Miami and later heading to Cuba with Spirit and back to CPH.

Does anyone know if the home land security controls when coming from Cuba are longer than usual because I got quite a tight connection and need to check in again.

I agree with your Aeroflot post.

Especially the business class product is very good. Very attentive, personal and friendly service. I felt that the crew was much better than on a recent Swiss flight in their new 777.

I think Oman Air are the best airline I have flown on in Y. Their economy class is almost like premium economy on other carriers - full amenity kit (I'm sure pretty sure most other airlines have stopped giving Y pax socks, for example), excellent legroom, comfortable seats, great IFE and great service from the crew. I have read a few trip reports that their J product is almost F standard. 

This was in 2012 (gosh that's four years ago already..) KUL-MCT-IKA-MCT-KUL after Air Asia X cancelled the route and I had to book at the last minute - what a blessing in disguise! 

And agree with above post(s) about Swiss and the 777 - I had an exit row seat so was okay for me, but if I hadn't I think it would have been pretty bad. To give an idea of their IFE, 'Alvin and the Chipmunks - The Squeakquel' was in their 'Classics' section, and the crew were very disinterested.

Norwegian is nice one but Lufthansa is my favorite so far.

From most to least favourite (all in lowly economy as I am only a student)

KLM: the staff speaks my native language and are always extremely spontaneous, nice and friendly. You get free coffee and beverage even on short ueropean flights. I flew with someone who had never flown before, and she started chatting wit h the nice flight attendant, about how to become a FA etc. And in the end we received a small bottle of bubbly wine to take with  us to celebrate her first flight ever, and we could look in the cockpit after landing !! It's also nice that they fly from AMS which is the closest  airport for me and they fly even to very small cities. I haven't flown their Fokker aircraft I don't think, but I'd like to before they go out of business.

I have never flown them long-haul, though. And the price is often (but not even always) a downside.

TAM Brasil: I have flown them both long and short haul. When flying to Brazil they gave me 2 free pieces of luggage of 23 kg, while all the others give only one. That was a big plus for me as Ï was going away for a long time. Even on short haul Brazil flights, they give you free luggage (I believe it's required by law in Brazil). They gave me an extremely good fare to fly to Brazil, but their intra-brazil fares are quite high, but all the other brazilian airlines are too. The in flight entertainment was fine. The flight back to europe, where nobody was sitting in the middle seat besides me, was very comfortable.

The food is a bit little and a bit poor though, but still very adequate. You don't get beer on domestic flights during the day which is a downside (with klm you can always get beer).  I think I had the same boring ham sandwich on all my brazilian domestic flights with them. But hey at least you get SOMETHING, right.

IRROPS during a domestic connection at CGH were handled reasonably well, although we had to walk back and forth a few gates and I was travelling with elderly people so that was a bit annoying. But probably not their fault.

Least favorite:

RyanAir I would think. You get what you pay for. RyanAir, Iberia Express and Wizz Air all are similar in terms of legroom and that you don't get anything on board. But RyanAir is the most annoying of those due to the constant play of commercials during the flight, selling of lottery tickets on board etc. At least once you sit in the wizz air airplane, you are set for a quiet, normal flight. Another downside of Ryanair is that they fly from EIN airport which is far for me.

However tomorrow I will be flying ryanair's only AMS route, namely to dublin. And it cost me only 35 euros round trip. I wont be needing luggage anyway, so that's an amazing deal for a quick day out in Dublin (returning day after).

Carriers such as Lufthansa, TAP Portugal, BA etc. are a bit in the 'in between' category for me. Not particularly nice people or good food, but okay. Ish.

Upside for me for TAP is that I can speak my native language Portuguese (I am of mixed heritage) , downside is that Lisbon airport is terrible (very long bus rides).

I don't remember having flown other carriers than the ones I listed. Oh alitalia way, way back. The experience then can't really be compared to now. And I have also flown on Varig many times as a kid. I remember I had to puke because of the food, however my parents really liked the food. So I am not sure if that's just me or the airline.

Right, let´s get some storytelling time about my first and last TAP experience, the worst carrier in the world (with arms wide open):

If no incidents like the one below happen TAP offers value for money and without the delays the short haul flights are acceptable. Though their lunch and diners are usually uneatable and the breakfast is dry. Never pick beef. Seats are nothing to be happy about the beverages are limited though cabin and flight crew are very skilled and very reassuring. The in flight entertainment has minimal screens and there are not that many options. The headphones offered are so bad that it is impossible to hear well while watching a movie and the engines are running. The wifi is ridiculously expensive.

 

I flew with TAP Portugal from Copenhagen to the Rio 2016 Paralympics as a guest of the IPC of France. Each of my four TAP flights was at least one hour late which was disappointing on the way to Rio as I had planned a four hour stop over in Lisbon. In my first flight from CPH to LIS, I had a bunch of Philipineese pilgrims behind me who after that I lowered my seat started kicking it, screaming at me and dropping the tray table to the point that it broke. Jokingly I would say that they all sounded like a herd of chickens. After the delay I could still not resist to see Lisbon which is one of my favorite cities in the world. Basically I only had time to run to the Praça do Comércio buy mosquito spray to be protected from Zika. As the sun was setting I ran to the best restaurant in Lisbon in my opinion which is The Maria do Carmo Restaurant  an absolute must especially as my nine hour flight to Rio would be through the night. I had not time to get appetizer or desert and had to tell them to hurry up with the main course, it was wonderful but with little time to enjoy. The night flight to Rio arrived one hour late as expected.

 

One the way back when I only had a one and a half hour scheduled connection time but as the flight arrived one hour and ten minutes I only had twenty minutes to connect. The stewardesses assured me saying that connection where waiting for me as soon as we land. There where no one waiting for me and i had to take the buss with everybody else. In the end I found someone who wanted to hand me tickets 10 hours later but I refused. In the end I went to connections where there where 100 people at least and this was 9AM. Two desks where open one for Star Alliance Gold (which I am) which had two people before me and the other queue with everybody else each having only one agent on duty. The people waiting in the normal queue started asking me if I really was a Gold Member so I had to show my Gold Card. When my turn came I was offered tickets 10 hour later and when asking to be re booked on other carriers they said "SAS is full and we do not re book on low cost carriers like Norwegian". In the end an equally desperate African woman passed out and fell on the floor. I was one of the first to rush to her recuse. I told the idiotic woman behind the desk who did not even react to the woman passing out "Is this how you threat your customers?". She ignored everything I said for a couple of minutes and handed me the tickets (10 hours later), 16 Euros of food checks and told me "WHERE DO YOU THING YOU ARE THIS IS NOT EMIRATES". And only ignored me. If my employees ever said something like that I would have fired them. As I had been flying all night through turbulence I did not feel like going to the city. I spent my 16 Euros on KFC (not the best choice but it is comforting) went to their extremely uncomfortable lounge which does not have hot food and used my Mac which I always carry with to do some work. The flight to Copenhagen was of course also one hour late. I have never had any worse flight experience and I fly a lot. I have even gotten the skiing world champion Jon Olsson from Sweden to agree that TAP is the worst airline he has ever flown.

Virgin Atlantic.

Only flown once but by far my favourite.

The ladies on board were very attentive, service with a smile (and red high heels) and were very generous.

I flew on a 789 which was a nice aircraft to spend 10 hours on. The interior was very well thought out and the in flight entertainment was loaded with quite a lot of good content.

Free alcohol is always a bonus in which I ensured I had a fair few!

To me, it depends by region.

For North American flights, I must say I prefer Delta -- they have one of the best on-time records, and their service is usually acceptable compared to UA/AA and are much larger than B6/AS/HA, making it much more useful for my schedule. Besides, they still have 717s and MD88/90s, and who wouldn't want to fly on a MadDog?

For Asian flights, I prefer JAL (Japan Airlines), as they have a good on-time record, and have service which is absolutely fantastic in all classes. Besides, JAL has 787s, which are such a pleasure to fly on. JAL has such an incredible hard and soft product, and their price from ICN is VERY cheap.

For European flights, I prefer KLM and British Airways. BA has many flights from the US to Europe, and round trips aren't overly expensive -- who doesn't want to spend a couple hours in London on the way to other places? Besides, BA has good (enough) service and lounges. KLM has an amazing shade of blue and connection opportunities with Delta, so naturally I fly KLM a lot. However, I find that their new economy product is getting increasingly tighter with 3-4-3 on the 777 and 3-3-3 on the 787. Yeesh!

Sadly I have not been able to try any South American, African, or Australian airlines yet -- but they're on my list for the future!

I will add an other entry to my best airline experience ever. You might think I am weird for saying this but then be it. It has to be Spirit Airlines. I flew with them on their third ever flight from HAV to FLL and i have never had any more pleasurable one hour in the sky.

I was last on board as I had been in the cd/dvd shop buying some last minute communist propaganda for own amusement, I arrived at the plane went straight in had a chat with the Barry (purser). I took my seat. It is the worse airline seat I have ever seen but it was ok. Continued my chat with the other two flight attendants at the back while we where waiting for flight clearance. Everybody was so nice and smiling and laughing with a generally relaxed atmosphere which is very unlike airlines where there is usually a very formal feeling atmosphere. Then the ground crew came on board (weird that Spirit does not use local firms). There where always smile on the faces of the crew and not those forced smiles one sees at Emirates. My seat neighbour was an ex cuban and a professional dancer so we had an interesting discussion and even with the turbulence the flight flight just so fun. I shook hands with Barry and went up with a smile on my face. Then that smile dissipated when I stood two hours in immigration as I had to rechecking my bags for my next flight. I love Spirit and at half the price of AA and Jetblue there is no reason to fly anything else. Especially as I thoroughly hate AA.

For pure entertainment, Easyjet or Ryanair. Just watching the people who have paid for speedy boarding(circa £10) actually looking smug and believing they are better than the 130 other PAX standing in a queue. Do they realise they are flying budget!!

The icing on the cake is when your aircraft is parked on a remote stand. The speedy boarders have all got on a bus for the short drive. However first on last of in most cases, see's the speedy boarders getting on last :-)))

Also Ryanair's trumpet recording for landing on time is hilarious, not surprising as they normally allocate 90mins for a 60min flight :-)

May I say Thai Airways International with good looking and friendly crew, delicious gourmet, and safe flight, and also Thai Smile Airways with on time flight.

I flew 8 times last year with Thai  AirAsia and  2 times with Thai Lion Air but both of them delayed more than 45 minutes every flights I have flown (without informing before arriving the airport) , so I don't like them.