Oneworld Alliance Celebrates a Quarter Century of Serving Travelers Across the Globe

An American Airlines Boeing 757 in special oneworld livery
The oneworld Alliance celebrates its 25th anniversary today, February 1, 2024, and trumpeted that it had carried 9 million passengers since its founding.
Every six seconds, a flight operated by a oneworld airline is either taking off or landing somewhere in the world, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, the group said.
The group was first announced in September 1998 by its founding members, American Airlines, British Airways, the now-defunct Canadian Airlines, Cathay Pacific, and Qantas.  It began operations on February 1, 1999.
At the time of its founding, its stated goals included smoother transfers for passengers travelling across all member airlines and greater support to passengers regardless of which member airline they are travelling with.
“We are happy to celebrate the world’s leading airline alliance with more than 200 million loyal customers around the globe,” said the alliance’s chairman, Robert Isom, who also serves as the CEO of American Airlines.
The group currently has 13 member airlines including the four surviving founding airlines as well as Alaska Airlines, Finnair, Iberia, Japan Airlines, Malaysia Airlines, Qatar Airways, Royal Air Maroc, Royal Jordanian, and SriLankan Airlines as well as Fiji Airways as a oneworld Connect partner.
Oman Air will join the alliance at some point later in the current year, the carrier said.
Swiss International Air Lines had been slated to join in 2003 after entering into a commercial agreement with British Airways but later decided not to proceed with that agreement and declined the invitation to join oneworld at that point.
Hungarian flag carrier Malév joined the alliance in 2007 but ceased operations in 2012. Also in 2007, Irish flag carrier Aer Lingus voluntarily exited the alliance when it switched its focus to being a low fares point-to-point carrier versus a premium airline in the oneworld model.
Archcompetitor Star Alliance, the world’s largest airline alliance, turned 25 in May of 2022.
(Photo: Accura Media Group)