Qatar Airways is the world's best airline in 2022. Commitment to keep the world's air routes open during COVID-19, innovation, new products, and world-renowned inflight service have combined to give Qatar Airways the prestigious AirlineRatings.com 2022 Airline of the Year award in its Airline Excellence Awards. AirlineRatings.com founder and Editor-in-Chief Geoffrey Thomas said that "Airline Ratings Excellence Awards are aptly named, for, at every touchpoint, excellence is the goal at Qatar Airways led by its Group Chief Executive, His Excellency Mr Akbar Al Baker." "Mr Al Baker’s drive for perfection has led to many improvements in both Airbus and Boeing aircraft and travellers across the world are better off because of the passion and the pursuit of excellence of Qatar Airways," Mr Thomas said. Mr Al Baker said: “Winning these awards are another ringing endorsement of everything that we stand for as an airline as Qatar Airways is fully committed to providing an unrivalled customer experience. "Our goal is to deliver excellence and once again securing the ‘Airline of the Year’, ‘Best Airline in the Middle East’ and ‘Best Business Class’ demonstrates that we continue to lead the industry as passengers return to the skies." The airline has a host of industry firsts. First to complete IATA’s important IOSA safety audit, first to be fully COVID audited and compliant by both AirlineRatings and Skytrax, and amongst the first to trial IATA’s COVID Safe Travel Pass. Qatar Airways is no stranger to the winner’s circle having picked up many awards for its service and cabin seating over the past ten years including a host of awards from AirlineRatings.com for its catering and business class Qsuite. The airline is at the forefront of developing and introducing new aircraft types such as the 787, A350, and 777X and it has one of the world's youngest fleets. It is spending millions to revamp aircraft cabins with new cabin product that includes the stunning business class Qsuites. "In our objective analysis Qatar Airways came out number one in many of our audit criteria, which is a great performance at this very difficult time,” Mr Thomas added. “For years Qatar Airways has been the gold standard, and it just keeps getting better with new passenger innovations and new state-of-the-art aircraft models." Qatar Airways is also awarded Best Business Class and Best Middle East Airline.