Travel

This Is America's Worst Airline

Douglas A. McIntyre

Published: January 23, 2025 9:45 am

One of America’s budget airlines was just named as the worst carrier in America. In a new Wall Street Journal poll, Frontier Airlines took that bottom spot.

Every year, The Wall Street Journal publishes its airline scorecard. The latest was its 17th edition. The yardsticks were on-time arrivals, number of flight cancellations, fewest delays over two hours, the fewest mishandled bags, the fewest complaints, and the least involuntary bumping. The numbers cover the year-long period that ended in November. Most of the data came from the Transportation Department.

Delta Air Lines topped the list, as it has for four years. It was followed by Southwest Airlines and Alaska Air. Late last year, Alaska Air bought Hawaiian Airlines, which was too small to make the list.

The next worst carrier on the list after Frontier was Spirit Airlines, which went bankrupt after a failed merger with JetBlue late last year.

Frontier has received poor grades from other rankings. It finished last on the J.D. Power airline list. The OAG ranked it eighth out of 10 carriers measured by on-time departures. It ranked last among U.S. carriers in 2023 based on a study by AirAdvisor.

Some reasons for complaints about Frontier are that it charges for some carry-on luggage, checked bags, and other items. Many carriers do not charge for any of these.

Ironically, Frontier Group Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ: ULCC) stock is up 125% in the past six months, while shares of Delta Air Lines Inc. (NYSE: DAL) are 54% higher.

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