Independently scored, no paid placement
How we score airlines
The Laters.com Airline Quality Score is our editorial rating, out of 10, for what an airline is actually like to fly once you have booked it. This page sets out what goes into it, what is left out, and how to tell us when something looks wrong.
What the score is
It is an editorial rating out of 10, shown on every airline page we publish. Every airline we ticket is scored on the same measures, so the numbers compare like for like before you book. Each measure is an editorial assessment of published facts, not a survey, a popularity vote or a paid listing.
The measures
Reliability & operations
How dependably the airline runs: punctuality, the shape of its network and the hubs it flies through. The sources are named third-party measurements, such as Cirium on-time performance, alongside the airline’s own published operational information.
Comfort & experience
What the cabin is like to sit in: seat pitch and layout, the cabins on offer, connectivity and in-flight service. It is assessed from the airline’s own published aircraft and cabin specifications rather than from our impressions of a single flight.
Value & network
What the fare buys once the extras are counted: baggage allowances, seat selection and the other optional fees, plus the reach of the network and its loyalty programme. It is assessed from the airline’s published baggage, fee and programme pages.
Professional airline rating
The airline’s rating from Skytrax, the professional rating body, recorded as published. We do not re-weight it or fold other opinions into it: the star rating and the body that issued it are both shown.
A measure shown on an airline page always carries its sources on that page, next to the score it produced. A number you cannot trace is one we should not be printing.
How the headline is built
The headline is the plain average of the measures shown on the page, rounded to one decimal place. Nothing is weighted and nothing is adjusted afterwards, so the arithmetic can be checked from the page itself. A measure that cannot be traced to a source is dropped rather than guessed, and the average is taken over the measures that remain, which is why one airline page can show fewer measures than another.
What we deliberately leave out
- Safety. It is not a marketing metric and we will not rank carriers on it.
- Cancellation rate and fleet age. Omitted rather than estimated, until a sourced field exists for every airline.
- Any sub-metric we cannot attribute. An unsourced measure is dropped, not guessed.
- Blended third-party scores that mix in inputs we have already rejected elsewhere.
Independence
No airline pays to be rated, and no placement is sold. Airline pages carry no affiliate links. Laters.com earns from the fare as the merchant, whichever airline and whichever payment method you choose, so a score cannot change what we make.
Updates and corrections
Figures are re-checked when their sources publish new data, and each airline page shows the date its facts were checked. If a figure or an assessment looks wrong, tell us and we will check it against the source: contact us.