united states to italy

Personally don't think there is any one "best" airline if you are flying coach. All pretty miserable with min service. I go with schedule and pricing. If you have a choice of airline, then I would see if either one offers Economy Plus or some variation of economy plus and pay the price. But that would be my only variable factor.

Ditto Frank. EC or EP seats ARE awesome. Just one caveat; avoid US Air and Philly, no matter what prices you may find. Also look at flying into one city in Italy, and out of another (use the "multi city" option on the travel search site like Orbitz, Kayak, Farecompare, etc.) Find your flights on one of these sites, and book directly with the airline.

The best airline is the one that takes me there the quickest at the best possible price on the day I need to go. The important thing for me is to make sure that my landings equal my take offs. That's the one equation I care about. Everything else is secondary.

I take it you're from Kildeer, Illinois, which means you are going to be coming out of O'Hare. Despite O'Hare being the #2 airport in the world, they only have relatively few flights into Italy direct. Alitalia flies to Rome FCO, and American also flies there seasonally. There are other airlines going to European airports, but you'd have to transfer to other flights within Europe to get into Italy. Your airline chosen would depend on where you want city you want to go into and where you want to fly out of. Italy's best airports for North American Travel are Rome FCO and Milan Malpensa.
I suggest you figure out your flight cities and check Kayak.com looking for the shortest flight times.

You might also check Air Berlin, Icelandic Air, and other not well known airlines out of O'Hare. We are flying Air Berlin O'Hare to Frankfurt then onto Rome this fall.

You might also check Air Berlin, Icelandic Air, and other not well known airlines out of O'Hare. We are flying Air Berlin O'Hare to Frankfurt then onto Rome this fall.

We flew Aer Lingus from Chicago with a short layover in Dublin. They connect to Milan, Rome, Venice, Naples and maybe a couple other cities, so that makes open-jaw convenient. They were not fancy, but were clean, on time, friendly and had edible food. I would use them again without a 2nd thought.

This may be completely unfair, but I wouldn't fly Alitalia again, based on an experience this fall. Others may have a different take. And I've had a couple of pleasant experiences with Swiss International (price, personnel, experience). I'd fly them again. But it really depends on who has the best routes from your locale.

I'm partial to taking Lufhansa out of Seattle. Polar route to Frankfort, short layover (1-2 hrs) before departing to Rome. On time, comfortable and as far as I can tell, competitively priced.