Air India Reviews 102

Can't give 0 or minus stars.
Planes were seriously from early 90s
In flight entertainment? Lol doesn't exist.
Entire plane smells of curry and spicy food.
Staff on the plane literally can't explain what food they are serving. I asked if there's any non spicy options and rudely got told if I wanted non spicy food I should tell them days before.

Seriously it's a place by Indians for Indians and screw anyone else. Standards are awful. Staff are rude.

DISGUSTING is too mild.

I wish the airline would contact me but they literally don't care.

The Delhi IGI is another disgusting place. No staff to guide you. Info desks empty. Book a hotel room? Lol you will have more luck.

I booked two tickets from New York (JFK) to Bangkok (PNR 99U5N6) for a total of $621.60. Due to safety concerns regarding the current war climate, I attempted to reschedule for November, only to be met with systemic misrepresentation and dismissive customer service.

The Bait-and-Switch:Air India’s official FAQ page and their own on-site AI Assistant explicitly quoted a modification fee of INR 3,000 (~$36 USD) for my specific ticket (Class: YXWDWD, S). However, when I spoke to their supervisor (Case #16898008882), I was quoted an astronomical $1,069 just to change the dates—nearly double the original cost of the entire trip.Customer Service Failure:

March 21: The app offered a mere $15 refund for a $622 purchase.

March 22: Agent Anitesh (Case #38039727) was unhelpful and dismissive of safety concerns.

April 7: After a week of emails proving their own AI bot confirmed the lower fee, Air India sent a final response stating they "shall not be engaging in any further correspondence" regarding this matter.

It is entirely unacceptable for an airline to provide one price through their official digital support channels to encourage booking, only to demand predatory "fare differences" later that exceed the original ticket value.

I have maintained my active booking segments and am now considering filing a formal complaint with the US Department of Transportation (DOT) for unfair and deceptive practices under 14 CFR § 399.80.

Travelers beware: Air India does not honor its published policies and will "ghost" you once you provide evidence of their errors.

This is by far the worst experience I have ever had with an airline. Our total travel time was extended by 11 hours, and the customer service throughout the process was highly unsatisfactory.

We were originally scheduled to fly from SIN to DEL on 6/4 at 09:00, arriving in CPH the same day at 18:40 (local times). Three days before departure, we were informed of a change: departure from SIN on 5/4 at 23:00 and arrival in CPH on 6/4 at 19:40.

We contacted customer service immediately, as this change caused us to lose half a day of our holiday in Singapore, where we had already booked a hotel. We were informed that the flight was overbooked and that we no longer had confirmed seats. Customer service assured us that we would receive compensation, meals, hotel accommodation or lounge access, and that this was registered on our case.

At check-in in SIN, this information was confirmed.

However, upon arrival in DEL at 02:30, the transfer desk initially refused to review our case. After speaking with a supervisor, we were informed that the airport hotel was fully booked and that a visa should have been arranged three days in advance—contrary to what customer service had told us. Lounge access was also denied due to internal policies.

We were instead referred to a single restaurant offering a very limited pre-set meal, which was not adequate. As a result, we had to purchase our own food and spend approximately 10 hours in the airport without rest facilities.

On the final 11-hour flight from DEL to CPH, the in-flight entertainment system was not working at all.

Overall, the experience was characterized by inconsistent information, lack of proper assistance, and failure to deliver on basic passenger rights. Air India should improve coordination between customer service and airport staff, and ensure that passengers receive accurate information and adequate support during disruptions.

I cannot recommend flying with Air India based on this experience.

Flight AI162 from London Heathrow to Delhi on 6 March 2026 was delayed by over 13 hours with no proper explanation. The delay caused my connecting flight to Colombo to be rescheduled by a full 24 hours, completely ruining my travel plans and causing significant financial and emotional distress.

Air India approved GBP 520 compensation under UK261. However, the payment has never arrived — and the customer service experience trying to resolve this has been worse than the delay itself.

Here is what I experienced:

— Emails sent, rarely answered. I sent multiple detailed emails explaining the issue clearly. Most were ignored entirely. The few responses I did receive were generic, copy-paste replies that showed zero understanding of my actual problem.

— Called 3+ times, spoke to a different agent every time. There is clearly no handover or case notes between agents. Every call meant starting from scratch and re-explaining everything. Not a single agent took the time to properly understand the situation before responding.

— Escalations that go nowhere. I was told multiple times that my case was being escalated and that I would receive a follow-up within 24-48 hours. Nothing came. No email, no update, no resolution.

— Agents who don't understand the problem. When I explained the specific technical issue preventing me from receiving my payment, agents either dismissed it or simply told me to wait for an email — without actually investigating or attempting to fix anything.

— One agent promised to personally follow up by end of business day. I never heard from her again.

Weeks have passed. I have filed a formal complaint with the UK Civil Aviation Authority (CAA). No passenger should have to fight this hard to receive money that the airline itself has confirmed they owe.

If you are considering flying Air India, be aware: if anything goes wrong, do not expect their customer service to help you.

I with my wife travelled by Air India from YYZ-DEL-BKK-DEL-YYZ in Feb/March 2026. We paid for front row seats in the Economy class for all the sectors assuming that these are bulk head seats however it turned out that these were regular seats for the travel DEL-BKK-DEL (YYZ-DEL-YYZ was fine), right behind the Premium Economy seats giving no extra space although paid more than Exit row and almost double of the row behind us.
Writing to nodal officer and appellateauthority to get some refund was in vain although provided all the snapshots and fare details. In fact, the response from appellateauthority came within 15 minutes at 10 PM IST from no_reply address implying that no review was done by this higher authority, no further correspondence would be entertained and did not even suggest what I could do next shutting the case completely.
Further, in-flight entertainment and USB power ports were broken for many seats for YYX-DEL sector for a flight of 16-20 hours. Imagine the discomfort of flying for so many hours in such conditions. The issues were reported to the crew but surprisingly there was no change when we flew back 5 weeks later from DEL to YYZ (on exact same seats) as if flying with such broken plane is normal for Air India.
I had great hopes that things will improve under Tata but it seems that it is deteriorating further under this management. We will never fly Air India, an airline which does not care about its passengers and their comforts.

DISGUSTING 🤢
•gross •poor communication •in flight food is horrible

Yesterday I took a flight from New Delhi to Amsterdam, I could go on about New Delhi airport on its own.. it’s a horrible experience. But the international flight with the Air bus aircraft is the absolute worst I have ever seen in my life… the staff is nice and the service on board was fine… but the cleanliness is terrible. Stains EVERYWHERE, the seats are made of fabric.. so I can assure you those have never been cleaned. And the toilets😳 I have seen Porto-potty’s at raves cleaner than what I saw on this Aircraft… the smell of piss is just soaked in the carpet everywhere, and the toilets for real look like they have not been cleaned in AGES.

Our original connecting flight by the way, was also cancelled. We had en 2 hour lay over, but the we got a message that they rescheduled the connections flight 30 min earlier. And WIRHOUT ANY COMMUNICATIOn, air India went ahead and cancelled the flight… we had to rebook the flight, but because we booked through an external partner, the service was horrendous. When we got the India airport after a flight from Bangkok, we had to wait for 12 hours.. which was bad enough on its own, BUT TEY ALSO ONLY CONFIRMED OUR SECOND FLIGHT FROM DEHLI TO AMSTERDAM 1 HOUR BEFORE TAKE OFF…. So those 10 hours we had to wait we also still where not sure if the flight would still depart…

And then finally.. as an Indian food lover… the food was horrible. And objectively I don’t think Indian food is the e best thing to serve on an airplane, due to strong smells.. again I love Indian food. But the quality was poor…

On a 11 hour flight from New Delhi to Copenhagen (12,5 hours if you count the waiting time in airplane before takeoff) we were served drinks 1 time! One time in 11 hours flight. That’s crazy. There was only vegetarian tofu left for me and 10 other people when the food reached us, I don’t like tofu so i basically didn’t eat for the whole flight. There was also a snack served later- same issue.
Had to go all the way to the other end for a glass of water efter 5 hours flight.
This company is a scandal and a joke, I’m chocked Air India a part of Star alliance!
It felt like a discount airline that you pay a lot of money for. I wrote a complain, let’s see if I hear anything… I don’t have any expectations.

NEVER USE THIS Airline
No service, change of schedule, meaning 12 hours lay over, no hotel, no food, nothing…….NEVER AGAIN

I sent in a request for refund after a 12 hour delay. Initially this was denied despite confirmation from the airline of the delay. I was then offered 230 and finally the full refund but would have to send lots of information to obtain the money. The next week my email and laptop were targeted by hackers from the US and Japan. There has been no reply to my emails since.

I recently miss-booked a flight and immediately cancelled it via customer support to make another booking. The person I got in touch with was very friendly and totally helpful, who immediately issued full refund. Was somewhat worried about refund as I read many negative experiences however, within 4 days I received full amount back. Therefore in favor of Air India I am glad to add my positive review and express my gratitude.

Third rate airliner, looking for ways to scam you. My recent experience was to have the gate closed on me in DEL on my interconnecting flight CDG - DEL - BLR.
The gate closed on time even though I was on my way and only a couple minutes late due to delay in CDG - DEL from its original schedule. Then instead of putting me on the next flight for the inconvenience, I was coerced to pay something called gate no show penalty to be put on the next flight, I complied due to my need to be back home after the long haul. Staff are very unfriendly and clearly lack the professionalism needed to run an airline business.

I have flown twice with Air India very recently - Delhi to Bali and Singapore to Delhi, and was very disappointed.
I normally do 20-25 flights per year on various airlines, ranging from the top tier long haul airlines to the low cost short flight airlines, and my wife worked as cabin crew with Virgin Atlantic, so I am always observing.

The Air India cabin crew although friendly, I found were very lazy, happy to do the bare minimum and a definite lack of proactiveness. Some of the cabin crew were too busy posing and acting entitled to actually do their job to their best,
In addition to this, I observed a number of safety related errors, of which the most worrying was leaving a fully loaded service trolley unattended for 10 minutes directly next to our seat while the crew member was speaking with a colleague in a different cabin. The pre landing safety checks were hit and miss.
I very much would like Air India to become a quality airline, and one of the places they can start with is by shaking up their cabin crew recruitment and training procedures to enable them to have the best cabin crew in the sky. An empowered, well trained and empathetic cabin crew team gives the passenger a feeling of safety, security and comfort.

The passenger has mobility issues in her feet and requires wheelchair assistance. However, both Amritsar airport staff and Delhi airport staff told us they were “out of wheelchairs.” This is unacceptable for an international airline. How can an airport run out of wheelchairs for passengers who genuinely need mobility assistance?
We tried calling Air India at least 20 times. Every time the automated system asked for the ticket number. We entered the correct ticket number followed by #, but the system repeatedly said, “Sorry, an error occurred,” and then disconnected the call. Even the Canada support number did the same thing. It was impossible to reach a human agent.
Denying wheelchair assistance to a passenger with mobility issues and having a completely dysfunctional customer service system shows a serious lack of responsibility and care for passengers.
Extremely frustrating and highly disappointing experience.

Air India complaint
This is the first time travelling to India through Air India to Madras. The people were rude in Dubai, especially Mahesh and Abrar - they made me wait for 2 hours stating your flight is only at 11 AM. Keep calling no one responding. Mahesh does not know his job... it was real struggle and frustrating for a long journey from US to Dubai and people were extremely rude. I am sorry to bring to this consumer affairs ... I travelled from MCO - Orlando to Chennai MAA. In All these 30 years of me being in United States, and going to see my mother in Madras/Chennai now... I never had an issue.... I never had a complaint. This time, I had to shell out 260 dollars plus taxes at Dubai International airport. The people at the airport were rude. They are not part of United. Still i need to find a way to report. I work for the USN -United States Navy/Department of Navy. As a Civilian. This has never happened before I have all the receipts. I would be able to scan and produce all of it, once i reach Orlando/MCO on February 2nd, 2026. This kind of act or should not be tolerated...
Thanks & Best Regards,
Respectfully Submitted,
Sridhar Rangaswamy ("Sri")
US Trademark: 5030763
US Trademark #SN 98620494:
"Promise Less/Under Promise and Deliver More"
"Excellence is not an act, it is a Habit."
"Honesty is the Best Policy “Be Truthful, Honest and Fair"

New lows as Air India’s website is now essentially at scam level. Extra for bags (which isn’t too bad), £20 for additional bags on the way back so we took it. Paid for another outbound bag - but found out at the airport this wasn’t an additional bag, it was for excess weight.
I’m not unhappy about paying for the 3rd bag it’s the fact that I had to pay another £150 during check in.
Website is awful, misleading and deliberately designed to get things wrong, check everything multiple times. Air India will sting you for more money. Even the check in counter said this mistake has been made by many customers. So they should fix this rather than fleecing more money.
Never using them again…

It can always be better but when things go as planned, it's usually good enough. Just one time power sockets didn't work but otherwise, the food always compensates for everything. Mostly reliable.

Shitty customer service and very rude behaviour every time, never flying air india again

⭐☆☆☆☆
Worst airline experience ever – Air India

I was supposed to fly on the 19th at 09:10, but Air India somehow thought it was acceptable to delay the flight until 18:00. That’s almost 9 hours of delay, with no proper explanation and zero consideration for passengers.

As if that wasn’t bad enough, our connection in New Delhi turned into a 9-hour layover, while it was originally supposed to be just 1 hour. They clearly take no responsibility at all for people’s time, plans, or exhaustion.

The worst part?
👉 We were informed only 1 hour in advance that the flight was cancelled. That is unbelievably unprofessional and completely unacceptable.

And being stuck in Delhi is awful — the air is dirty and unbearable. No one wants to be forced to spend hours there.

Terrible planning, terrible communication, terrible service.
I will never fly with Air India again and would strongly advise everyone to avoid this airline.

Greetz Travelers from the Netherlands 🇳🇱

Never fly this cheap shabby airline AIR INDIA pretending to be an international Airline. I had stopped flying Air India about 50 yrs ago due to their extremely poor service and unreliability in every sense delays and cancellations was a regular occurrence.
After 50 yrs I was forced to to give them another chance on a flight from Amritsar ti Delhi and then to Male as no other airline was available …,and guess what nothing has changed …Flight was delayed by 5 hrs which meant we couldn’t make the connection to Male , a day gone out of our holiday in expensive Maldives .We were put up in disgusting 2 star hotel and we even had to make our own way as after 1.5 hrs the arranged cab hadn’t arrived. Filling a claim form is the next nightmare … at it for 2 hrs still not there 😡😡😡😡😡