AirBaltic vs SAS (2026): Which Should You Actually Book?

A young Baltic hybrid that does one thing brilliantly — short-haul comfort out of Riga — against a Nordic legacy carrier with real long-haul, lie-flat business and, since 2024, a brand-new alliance behind it.

airBaltic (BT) and SAS (SK) are the two names a traveller weighs across the Baltics and Nordics, and they are built for different jobs. airBaltic is a focused short-haul hybrid: a single, young Airbus A220-300 fleet flown from Riga, with free Starlink wifi and a cabin bag inside its normal fares. SAS is a full-service Scandinavian legacy carrier — a mixed fleet that runs everything from A320neo short-haul to A350 long-haul, a lie-flat business cabin to Asia and North America, lounges, and a proper frequent-flyer programme. On a Copenhagen–Riga hop they look like rivals; on a Copenhagen–Tokyo run only one of them even sells a ticket.

One fact you must get right, because it changed recently and trips up a lot of comparisons: SAS is no longer in Star Alliance. It left Star Alliance on 31 August 2024 and joined SkyTeam on 1 September 2024, as part of the restructuring that brought Air France-KLM in as a shareholder. airBaltic, for its part, has never joined an alliance and says it prefers to stay independent. Our ratings give airBaltic 68/100 and SAS 50/100 — but that gap is about short-haul consistency, not total capability, because these two aren’t really playing the same game. The real question is which job you’re buying for.

Side-by-side, on real numbers

The figures below come from the live fares aifly tracks plus current published policy and our sourced cabin data — not vague “Standard / Standard” filler.

Comfort/fleet/OTP from sourced 2025–26 ratings; bag and fee figures reflect each airline’s cheapest bookable fare and can change — always confirm at booking.

Different jobs: a short-haul specialist vs a full-service legacy

The single most important thing to understand is that these airlines are built to do different work, so “which is better” depends entirely on the trip. airBaltic is a short-haul specialist and nothing else — one aircraft type, point-to-point and hub connections around the Baltics and Europe, no long-haul, no widebodies. It does that narrow job unusually well. SAS is a legacy flag carrier that still carries the full range: dense short-haul across Scandinavia, plus intercontinental flying to North America and Asia on widebody jets, with the multi-cabin, multi-class apparatus that implies.

That shapes everything downstream. On a Riga–Copenhagen or Vilnius–Oslo sector, the two are directly comparable and airBaltic’s modern, focused product tends to shine. But SAS’s reason to exist is the journey airBaltic can’t offer at all — the onward widebody leg, the through-fare to Bangkok or Chicago, the business cabin, the alliance connections. Don’t judge them on a single metric; judge them on what your itinerary actually needs. For a hop, that’s comfort and price; for a big trip, it’s reach and cabins.

It’s worth noting that airBaltic’s narrowness is a strength, not just a limitation. Because it flies one type on one focused network, it can keep the fleet young, the operation simple and the everyday product consistent in a way a sprawling legacy carrier can’t. SAS’s breadth is the opposite trade: it can take you almost anywhere in a choice of cabins, but it carries the cost and complexity of a mixed fleet, multiple hubs and a full-service overhead. Neither approach is wrong — they’re answers to different questions, and the traveller who books well is the one who’s clear about which question they’re asking on this particular trip.

SAS left Star Alliance on 31 August 2024 and joined SkyTeam the next day — count SkyTeam benefits, not Star, when you book it.

The alliance switch you must not get wrong: SAS is SkyTeam now, airBaltic is independent

This is the fact most likely to be out of date in your head, so pin it down. SAS spent decades as a founding member of Star Alliance — and then left. Its last day in Star Alliance was 31 August 2024; it joined SkyTeam on 1 September 2024, a move driven by Air France-KLM taking a shareholding as part of SAS’s restructuring. So if you hold Star Alliance status (United, Lufthansa, Turkish and the like), SAS no longer earns or recognises it; SAS’s EuroBonus programme now sits inside SkyTeam, earning and redeeming with the likes of Air France, KLM and Delta, and top-tier EuroBonus members hold SkyTeam Elite Plus. Book SAS expecting Star Alliance perks and you’ll be disappointed — that link is gone.

airBaltic sits outside all of this by choice. It belongs to no global alliance and has repeatedly said it intends to stay independent, preferring a wide web of interline and codeshare partners it would risk losing inside an alliance. Practically, that means airBaltic gives you no alliance status or partner lounges, but a lot of connectivity through its own network and partnerships; SAS gives you a full SkyTeam membership with status, lounges and partner earning across a global network. If alliance benefits are part of how you travel, this is a clean point for SAS — just make sure it’s SkyTeam you’re counting, not Star.

Short-haul cabin: airBaltic's A220 and free wifi vs SAS's older narrowbodies

On the short sectors where they actually compete, airBaltic has the fresher hardware. Its entire fleet is the Airbus A220-300, averaging around four years old, flown in a 2-3 economy layout that spares a third of the cabin the middle seat, with large windows and a quiet ride. SAS flies a capable modern short-haul fleet too — A320neo-family jets — but across its whole operation the average aircraft age is higher, and its narrowbody economy is the standard 3-3 layout. On the metal itself, airBaltic’s single young type is the more consistent, comfortable short-haul seat.

Then there’s connectivity, where airBaltic pulls clearly ahead: free, fast Starlink wifi on every flight, rolled out across its entire A220 fleet by May 2026. SAS offers onboard wifi as well, but as a paid product rather than a free one. So on a two-hour Nordic-Baltic hop, airBaltic gives you the newer cabin and free internet, while SAS gives you a solid but older short-haul seat and charges for the wifi. Where SAS’s cabin advantage reappears is up front and long-haul — but on the short-haul sectors these two share, airBaltic’s everyday product is the nicer one.

Where SAS is untouchable: long-haul and a real business class

Step beyond short-haul and the comparison ends, because only SAS can carry you. SAS runs genuine intercontinental flying — A350 and A321LR widebody and long-range operations to North America (New York, Newark, Chicago) and Asia (Tokyo, Seoul, Bangkok, Mumbai) — anchored on its Copenhagen hub with Oslo and Stockholm alongside. airBaltic has none of this; it is short-haul only, so for any journey that needs to cross an ocean or a continent, SAS isn’t the better option, it’s the only one in this pair.

The premium product is just as decisive. SAS sells a real lie-flat SAS Business cabin on its long-haul widebodies (a staggered 1-2-1 layout with direct aisle access on the A350), plus SAS Plus premium economy, lounges and the whole full-service ladder. airBaltic offers a Business Class on the A220, but on a short-haul jet that means a recliner with the adjacent seat blocked and priority handling — a genuine step up for a hop, but not a flat bed and not a long-haul product. So if your trip calls for a proper business seat, an overnight lie-flat, or premium economy, SAS is playing a game airBaltic doesn’t enter. This is the clearest split on the page: for the big trip and the pointy end, SAS; airBaltic simply doesn’t compete there. And it’s not only the seat you’re buying up front — SAS’s long-haul premium comes wrapped in the full-service package a widebody operation supports: lounge access before the flight, priority check-in and boarding, a checked-bag allowance built into the fare, and a multi-course meal service in the air. That ecosystem is precisely what a short-haul specialist has no reason to build, so on an intercontinental trip the gap between the two isn’t a matter of degree — it’s the difference between a carrier that offers the product and one that doesn’t fly the route at all.

On a Nordic-Baltic hop airBaltic usually edges it; the moment the trip needs long-haul or a lie-flat, SAS is the only one that can carry you.

Networks: a Baltic hub against a Scandinavian legacy map

The maps reflect the models. airBaltic is a hub carrier built around Riga (RIX), with bases in Tallinn (TLL) and Vilnius (VNO), and is the connectivity backbone of the Baltic states — the natural, best-connected choice to, from and across the region and into Europe, feeding traffic through Riga so it can sell through-tickets a point-to-point carrier can’t. Its scope is Baltic-and-European, and within it airBaltic is the local specialist.

SAS is the Scandinavian legacy network, anchored on Copenhagen (CPH) with major operations at Oslo (OSL) and Stockholm (ARN). Its short-haul map blankets the Nordics and reaches across Europe, and its long-haul arm — now feeding into and out of the SkyTeam network — carries you onward to North America and Asia. The two overlap on the Nordic-Baltic sectors, where you’ll see both, and there SAS’s alliance connections and airBaltic’s Riga-hub connections are different flavours of the same convenience. Away from those shared hops, the split is clean: for Baltic-centred travel airBaltic is usually the sharper tool; for a Scandinavian departure heading long-haul or connecting across SkyTeam, SAS’s network is built for it. There’s also a coverage point worth weighing: airBaltic reaches Baltic-adjacent corners — the Caucasus, the eastern Mediterranean — that a Scandinavian legacy network serves more thinly, while SAS reaches whole continents airBaltic never touches. Neither map is a subset of the other, so on some journeys the deciding factor is simply which airline flies where you’re going at all.

Fares, reliability & the everyday: airBaltic's edge on the hop

On price, the short-haul sectors are where a real comparison lives, and there airBaltic is often the keener fare — SAS’s typical pricing sits higher, weighted as it is toward a premium, long-haul-inclusive network. Both airlines’ cheapest short-haul fares are hand-baggage-only, but they no longer stop in the same place: SAS Go Light includes a cabin bag, while airBaltic’s cheapest Economy MINI (since 6 May 2026) carries a personal item only, 40 x 30 x 15 cm — the cabin bag starts at Economy BASIC. So a fair comparison means matching the fare types and adding your bag to each; do that and airBaltic frequently comes out level or cheaper on the shared hops while offering the newer cabin and free wifi. Where SAS’s higher price buys something real is on the long-haul and premium products airBaltic can’t match — you’re paying for a different, bigger service, not just a dearer seat.

On reliability, airBaltic holds a modest edge in our data — its 2025 on-time performance ran a few points ahead of SAS’s, helped by the operational simplicity of one aircraft type and one core hub, while SAS still carries some residue of its 2024–25 restructuring across a larger, more complex operation. Both are safe, well-run European carriers, and SAS’s four-star service rating reflects a genuinely more polished full-service experience when you want it. But for the everyday short hop — newer plane, free wifi, cabin bag included, slightly better punctuality, often a lower fare — airBaltic quietly wins the day-to-day. Keep SAS for when the trip outgrows what a short-haul specialist can do.

Loyalty, lounges & who each airline is really for

The loyalty question splits as cleanly as everything else on this page. SAS’s EuroBonus is a full-service frequent-flyer programme, and since the SkyTeam move it earns and burns across a global network — Air France, KLM, Delta and the rest — with SAS’s top tiers carrying SkyTeam Elite Plus status, lounge access and the usual priority ladder. If you fly regularly and want status that follows you across a worldwide alliance and into airport lounges, that’s a meaningful, tangible benefit, and it’s SAS’s to offer. airBaltic Club is a leaner, single-airline scheme: you earn points and spend them on baggage, seating and perks, which is useful if airBaltic is your local carrier, but it doesn’t plug you into a global network or a lounge programme, because airBaltic deliberately stands outside the alliances.

So who is each airline really for? airBaltic is for the Baltic-and-Nordic traveller who mostly flies short-haul and wants the best everyday seat for the money — modern jet, free wifi, cabin bag included, keen fare, no interest in status they won’t use. SAS is for the traveller whose flying is bigger and broader: long-haul trips, premium cabins, a frequent-flyer balance that matters, connections stitched across a global alliance. Plenty of people are genuinely both at different times — airBaltic for the weekend hop to Copenhagen, SAS for the business trip to New York — and there’s nothing wrong with keeping both in your search. Just book each for the job it’s built to do.

airBaltic gives you the newer cabin and free Starlink wifi on the short sectors; SAS gives you the widebody, the flat bed and the alliance.

So — which one?

Frequently asked questions

Fares, fleet and policy details verified July 2026 and reflect each airline’s cheapest bookable fare unless noted; programmes and rollouts change — always confirm at booking.