By Maureen O’Hare, CNN
(CNN) — There are a lot of variables involved in keeping airline and airport schedules running on time, from staffing challenges to unpredictable weather.
With an estimated 38.9 million flights taking place internationally in 2025, and a delicate geopolitical landscape causing airspace constraints, the hurdles impacting punctuality are getting trickier than ever.
In the aviation industry, structural constraints “have become part of the baseline, not just temporary disruptions,” says aviation analytics firm Cirium in its new report, “On-Time Performance Review 2025.”
It highlights 12 airports and airlines around the world that last year excelled in terms of punctuality, thus reaping the rewards in terms of passenger satisfaction and cost savings.
Let’s break down who won and why.
Performance and reliability
Istanbul Airport (IST) was the Platinum Winner airport for 2025, leading the world when it comes to performance and reliability.
This Turkish mega-hub is one of the world’s busiest and best-connected airports, handling more than 84 million passengers annually across 330 destinations. In April 2025, it became Europe’s first airport to implement triple independent runway operations, which increased its capacity from 120 to 148 movements per hour.
Positioned at the crossroads of Europe, Asia, the Middle East and Africa, minor disruptions here could quickly spread across regions and time zones if left unchecked, but Cirium says Istanbul Airport demonstrated in 2025 that “scale and complexity can coexist with consistency and control.”
The airport’s on-time performance (OTP), defined by Cirium as the percentage of flights departing or arriving within 15 minutes of schedule, was 80.72%. On that criteria alone, Istanbul ranks No. 19 in the world in the large airport category, between San Francisco International (SFO) at No. 18 and Detroit Metropolitan Wayne County (DTW) at No. 20.
However, Cirium stresses that its Platinum Winner awards are based on complete operational performance, balancing on-time performance with schedule execution, daily operational control, and recovery capability over a full year.
Wins for Latin America
Sticking to OTP alone, the world’s best-performing large airport was Chile’s Santiago Arturo Merino Benitez International Airport, which maintained 87.04% punctuality across 153,326 flights serving 68 routes. In 2022, the airport inaugurated its brand-new Terminal 2, which more than doubled its annual passenger capacity.
Panama City Tocumen International was the world’s best-performing medium-sized airport, maintaining 93.34% punctuality across 148,065 flights serving 96 routes.
Ecuador’s Guayaquil José Joaquín de Olmedo International was the world’s No. 1 small airport, achieving 91.47% punctuality across 34,068 flights serving 19 routes.
Cirium defines large airports as those handling 25 to 50 million seats annually, medium airports are those handling 15 to 20 million, and small airports handle between 5 and 15 million.
Platinum Winner airline
Qatar Airways, which in 2025 was named the world’s best airline by air transport rating organization Skytrax, added another award to its shelf by being named the Platinum Winner airline.
Last year the airline delivered 84.42% on-time performance, up from 82.83%