No 10 Thai Airways

Singapore Airlines was named Airline of the Year at the Skytrax World Airline awards this year, beating last year's champion, Qatar Airways, into second place.

Launched in 1999, the awards are seen as the aviation industry's equivalent of the Oscars and are voted by customers in the global annual airline passenger satisfaction survey conducted by Skytrax, an international air transport rating organization based in the United Kingdom.

The focus of the survey is for customers to make their own personal choices. Customers nominate their favorite airline or airline they consider to be best, and rank their satisfaction on a 1 to 5 scale for aspects of the travel experience, including the airport and onboard services and environment.

Asian and Middle Eastern airlines were predominant in the top 10 list. ANA All Nippon Airways, Emirates and EVA Air took up the third, fourth and fifth spots, respectively, while Cathay Pacific was sixth, Hainan Airlines eighth, Garuda Indonesia ninth and Thai Airways in 10th place.