Narita Airport vs KLIA2 Review – Part 1

Following my previous airport review between KLIA2 and Don Mueang Bangkok, many have asked for my thoughts on other regional airports.

Here is my first part of the Narita Airport vs KLIA2 review, a three-part series, and also a congratulatory to KLIA2 for winning some awards.

My mission in doing these airport reviews is to help raise awareness about the state of airport services, which many travellers take for granted. By doing so, I provide constructive feedback to the relevant parties – without bias and prejudice.

Narita Airport vs KLIA2 Review

The systematic planning at Narita Airport.

In March 2019, I enjoyed visiting Narita International Airport in Tokyo and acquainted myself with its Terminal 3, dedicated to low-cost carriers.

The timing was so good that it was around this time that Skytrax announced its world’s best airports awards, including for low-cost carrier terminals – LCCTs.

I found that both Narita T3 and KLIA2 were rated the Top 3 best LCCTs in the world, which is quite an achievement if you ask me.

Two other very popular Japanese airports took the top spots, and the Top 3 Best LCCT for 2019 are;

No. 1 – Osaka Kansai T2

No. 2 – Narita Airport T3

No. 3 – KLIA2

Here is the list of the World’s Best Low-Cost Airline Terminals in 2019.

With KLIA2 coming Top 3 among the world’s best LCCT indeed came as an immense saving grace for Malaysia.

Why do I say this? Well, KLIA, as our main international airport, could only afford the 54th spot among the world’s best airports. Obviously, something needs to be done to reach that position.

For the record, Narita International was at No 9, and our closest neighbour Singapore Changi was again at No 1. I do not blame the latter, as they go all out to woo passengers into Singapore.

World’s Best Airport By Passenger Numbers

klia-airport Narita Airport vs KLIA2 Review - Part 1

A view of KLIA Airport in Malaysia.

However, if we go by passenger numbers, KLIA is pretty good after all, where we ranked No 4 for the 50-60 million passengers category.

That sounds like many passengers going through KLIA in the last year alone, and they are trying to up that number to move one more tier up to the 60-70 million passengers category.

And over on the AirHelp Airport Ranking 2019 site, KLIA comes in at a whopping number 120 with a score of 6.75 out of 10.

AirHelp focuses on passenger experiences, where the site ranks on-time performance, service quality and facilities as the main criteria.

On another airport ranking site called World Airport Codes, KLIA again comes in at Number 24 out of the Top 30 Airports in the World.

top-airports-in-the-world-2019 Narita Airport vs KLIA2 Review - Part 1

KLIA Ranks No.54 in the Top 100 Airports in the World for 2019.

Top 10 Airports in Asia

This is one category that all airports want to be ranked in, which is the Top 10 Airports in the region, and KLIA never made a list. What happened here?

Notice how Japan has four airports listed in the list of Top 10 Airports in Asia?

Singapore Changi
Tokyo Haneda
Seoul Incheon
Hong Kong
Centrair Nagoya
Tokyo Narita
Kansai
Taiwan Taoyuan
Shanghai Hongqiao
Seoul Gimpo

skytrax-awards Narita Airport vs KLIA2 Review - Part 1

The 2019 Skytrax Awards.

Back to KLIA2, for some strange reason, Malaysia Airports, which operates the airport, had on several occasions (and in media interviews) earlier claimed that KLIA2 was not an LCCT.

But when the news was out that they had won 3rd place in Skytrax’s awards, they congratulated themselves and even took to social media.

The conflicting statements aside, as Malaysians, we are very proud of the KLIA2 achievements.

narita-international-airport Narita Airport vs KLIA2 Review - Part 1

Narita’s Terminal 2 exterior. Photo Wikipedia.

Carried Away….

I wrote a little too much about the Skytrax Awards, and because of the timing, I wanted to share how the Japanese have made it their mission to rank their airports to be in the Top 10 of any airport ranking.

The Japanese airports are run independently and not by a monopoly; hence, they will improve their facilities, especially with Tokyo 2020 around the corner.

Conclusion

I would love to continue, but the article is getting a little long, so I will focus on Narita Airport in part two.

Stay tuned for Part 2 and Part 3 of the Narita Airport vs KLIA2 review, which I will publish weekly.

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