Whether you’re gearing up for a summer getaway or a winter escape, holiday planning takes time and effort. While you’re checking out the food and facilities at your departure and arrival airports, it’s also worth considering the overall atmosphere, including how welcoming the staff are.
To identify the world’s friendliest airports, we analysed over 71,000 Google reviews mentioning staff at over 120 of the busiest airports across the globe and in the UK. Within these reviews, we specifically searched for words relaying positive experiences such as “friendly”, “polite”, “helpful” and “professional” in order to rank the friendliest overall.
Key Findings:
- Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport is the world’s friendliest, with 73.6% of their reviews mentioning friendly, helpful and kind staff.
- Cornwall Airport Newquay followed in second place (73.3% positive reviews) and Narita International Airport in Japan completed the top three (73.1% positive reviews).
- Out of the 20 highest-ranking airports in our study, nine were located in North America, eight of which were in the United States.
- Across the most popular UK airports, Cornwall Airport Newquay came out as the friendliest airport, with an impressive 73.3% of positive reviews relating to staff.
- The next friendliest airports in the UK are Southampton Airport (70.9% positive reviews), London City Airport (66.6%), Exeter Airport (66.1%), Humberside Airport (65.4%) and Cardiff Airport (65.2%).
- Out of the UK’s busiest airports, Heathrow ranked as the 8th friendliest airport, beating London Gatwick (15th) and Manchester Airport (17th).
Which are the world’s friendliest airports?
To find the friendliest airports overall, we analysed up to 1,000 reviews for each airport that mentioned staff. If an airport had fewer than 1,000 such reviews, we used all available ones. We then searched these reviews for keywords related to staff friendliness and ranked the top 20 airports by the percentage of positive reviews out of the total reviews analysed.
Among the busiest airports worldwide and across the UK, five airports rose above the rest when it came to staff friendliness. For each of these top performers, over 70% of the reviews mentioning staff included positive descriptors such as “friendly”, “helpful”, “kind”, or “cheerful”.
Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport named the world’s friendliest airport
According to travellers’ reviews, the top three friendliest airports in the world are Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport (73.6%), Cornwall Airport Newquay (73.3%) and Narita International Airport in Japan (73.1%).
Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport in the city of Taipei flies to 101 different destinations across the globe including Abu Dhabi, Dallas, Jakarta and Seoul. [1] With dedicated spaces for children to play and even a gym and e-sports area, passengers travelling through this airport won’t be short on ways to keep themselves entertained while waiting for their flight. [2] For this airport, the most commonly used words to describe positive staff experiences include “friendly” (129 reviews), “helpful” (106 reviews) and “efficient” (42 reviews).
On the other hand, a much smaller airport and one much closer to home is Cornwall Airport Newquay in the South West of the UK. With around 160,000 passengers in the summer of 2024 [3], it’s clear that the staff in this airport have made a lasting impression on their travellers with 73.3% of their reviews relating to staff relaying a positive experience. Reviewers describe their experience with staff as “friendly” and “helpful”.
In third place is Narita International Airport with a close 73.1% of positive staff-related reviews. Here you’ll find a number of shops, restaurants, lounges and even beauty salons [4] while you prepare for the start of your trip.
Rounding off the top five friendliest airports is Southampton Airport (70.9%) and Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport in Arizona (70.4%).
North America is home to the friendliest airports
It seems the classic charm of American-style customer service is making a strong impression on travellers from around the world. Out of the 20 highest-ranking airports in our study, nine were located in North America. Eight of those were in the United States, with particularly positive results from airports in states such as Arizona, Utah, Minnesota, and Virginia.
Europe followed closely behind, with the United Kingdom standing out for its consistently friendly airport experiences. Six UK airports featured prominently in the rankings, including Cornwall Airport Newquay, Southampton Airport, London City Airport, Humberside Airport, and Cardiff Airport, where you can take advantage of the APH Cardiff Park & Ride
Most commonly used words to describe the friendliest airports
As part of the research, we analysed the language travellers used to describe airport staff, focusing on positive terms like “friendly”, “helpful”, and “kind”, and ranked the airports where these words appeared most often.
Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport topped the list with the word “friendly” appearing 409 times in reviews relating to staff, more than any other airport in the study.
In second place is Vancouver International Airport, Canada, with 327 reviews mentioning the word “friendly” when leaving reviews on the staff. In third place is the Harry Reid International Airport in Nevada with 303 reviews using the word “friendly”.
Interestingly, all five of the airports with the word “friendly” most commonly used are in North America, four of which are in the USA in particular.
London’s very own Heathrow Airport had the highest number of reviews describing staff as “helpful” (342 reviews). Alongside this, Dubai International Airport in the United Arab Emirates received the second-highest number of “helpful” reviews (326).
Rounding off the top three is Hamad International Airport in Doha, Qatar with 295 reviews noting helpful staff.
In Kempegowda International Airport Bengaluru, India, not only are the staff recognised for their friendly nature (196 reviews stating staff were “friendly”), but they are also known for their efficiency. 145 of the reviews for this airport highlighted how efficient the staff are.
In second place is Suvarnabhumi Airport in Bangkok, Thailand, receiving 128 reviews recognising how efficient the staff are.
In third place is Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport Mumbai in India, with 126 reviews recommending the efficient staff.
Lastly, we compared the most “polite” airports. Narita International Airport not only ranked as the third friendliest airport overall, but was also the most polite, with 87 reviews commending the staff.
In joint second place is Suvarnabhumi Airport in Bangkok, Thailand and Athens International Airport in Spata, Greece, both receiving 66 reviews regarding the politeness of their staff.
Rounding off the top four is Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport Mumbai in India with 55 reviews specifically mentioning how polite the staff are.
The UK’s friendliest airports
As part of our research, we also set out to identify the friendliest airports in the UK by taking a closer look at traveller reviews at some of the country’s busiest airports.
Cornwall Airport Newquay named the UK’s friendliest airport
In first place is Cornwall Airport Newquay with 73.3% of its reviews relating to staff reporting a positive experience. Following this is Southampton Airport (70.9%), London City Airport (66.6%) and Exeter Airport (66.1%).
From Southampton Airport, you can fly domestically to UK destinations such as Edinburgh, Newcastle or Glasgow, or further afield to stunning holiday locations such as Alicante or Palma Majorca. [5] You’ll also find a handful of shops for last-minute essentials and cafes for a quick bite before boarding. [6]
Located in the Borough of Newham, London City Airport ranked the third friendliest airport in the UK. Here, you can start your holiday to destinations such as Amsterdam. Barcelona, Florence or Ibiza. [7] The airport also caters well to those working on the move, with unlimited Wi-Fi and dedicated desk areas equipped with plug sockets. [8] Here, staff are described as “friendly”, “helpful”, “professional”, “efficient” and “pleasant”.
Other London airports to appear in the rankings are Heathrow Airport (63.8%) and London Gatwick (53%). Flying to bucket list locations such as New York City, Mumbai, Perth and Hong Kong City, [9] Heathrow is the UK’s biggest airport and in June 2025 welcomed over 7.3 million passengers. [10]
Edinburgh Airport ranked 16th and Manchester Airport, the UK’s second busiest airport [11], ranked as the 17th friendliest airport.
Methodology
To identify the world’s friendliest airports, we analysed over 71,000 Google reviews that mentioned staff, focusing on the 100 busiest airports globally, along with 23 of the busiest in the UK. We searched for 52 positive staff-related keywords, such as friendly, patient, polite, and professional while filtering out false positives and negatives (e.g., not friendly, not polite).
Airport lists were sourced from FlightsFrom.com (global) and WorldData.info (UK-specific) to ensure broad coverage.
We only included reviews mentioning terms like “staff”, “employee”, “TSA”, “crew”, “customer service”, etc. These reviews were dated from 20th May 2025 onwards and only compared reviews written in the English language.
We removed the duplicated and off-topic reviews and excluded airports with fewer than 50 relevant mentions of staff.
We used natural language processing (NLP) to analyse the meaning and tone of each review, giving us a more accurate measure of sentiment than simply counting positive or negative keywords.
Sources
[1] FlightsFrom.com ‘All scheduled direct (non-stop) flights from Taipei (TPE)’ https://www.flightsfrom.com/TPE
[2] Taoyuan International Airport, ‘Explore the Fun’ https://www.taoyuan-airport.com/explorethefun/en.html
[3] Cornwall Airport Newquay, ‘Cornwall Airport Newquay Reflects on a Busy Summer and Looks Ahead to an Exciting Autumn’
https://www.cornwallairportnewquay.com/press/cornwall-airport-newquay-reflects-on-a-busy-summer-and-looks-ahead-to-an-exciting-autumn
[4] Narita Airport, https://www.narita-airport.jp/en/
[5] Southampton Airport, ‘All Destinations’ https://www.southamptonairport.com/destinations/all-destinations/
[6] Southampton Airport, https://www.southamptonairport.com/shop-eat/
[7] London City Airport, ‘Destinations’ https://www.londoncityairport.com/flight-info/destinations
[8] London City Airport, ‘Services’ https://www.londoncityairport.com/at-the-airport/services
[9] Heathrow Airport, ‘Departures’ https://www.heathrow.com/departures
[10] Heathrow Airport, ‘Traffic statistics’ https://www.heathrow.com/company/investor-centre/reports/traffic-statistics
[11] WorldData.info ‘The 30 largest airports and airlines in the United Kingdom’ https://www.worlddata.info/europe/united-kingdom/airports.php