Star Air

Is Star Air safe?

Star Air has had no accident since it began flying in 2019, and the risk on any one of its flights is low. We score it 73. The catch is that the record is short and small, fewer than a dozen Embraer jets for seven years, and the regulator's 2025 audit found more lapses at Star Air than at much bigger airlines such as IndiGo and SpiceJet.

Star Air belongs to the Sanjay Ghodawat Group, a Kolhapur business group, and flies from Bengaluru to smaller cities in Karnataka, Maharashtra and Gujarat, many of them under the government's UDAN regional scheme. It says it has carried close to 3 million passengers. By September 2026 its share of Indian domestic traffic had passed SpiceJet's, mostly because SpiceJet has shrunk so far.

A clean but short record

There is no Star Air entry in the Aviation Safety Network accident data, and India's Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau (AAIB) has not published a report on any Star Air flight. Our accident rule puts an airline with no fatal accident but a short or low-volume record in the 80–94 band, and Star Air sits there with Air Astra and NovoAir, two small regional airlines in Bangladesh.

The most serious event we found is from 25 February 2025 at Chennai. An E175 bound for Bengaluru, with 40 people on board, lined up on the right-hand edge line of runway 07 instead of the centre line and began its take-off roll. The first officer warned the captain twice; he steered back to the centre line after about 360 metres and took off. Seven runway edge lights were broken. The Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) found that the captain had started the take-off without making sure the before-take-off checklist was complete. The aircraft was not damaged.

Two flights have turned back with technical problems, one to Bengaluru in July 2024 and one to Belagavi in August 2025. Both landed normally.

What the DGCA audit found

In the year to July 2025, the DGCA's surveillance audits recorded 41 findings at Star Air. Only Alliance Air (57) and Air India (51) had more; IndiGo had 23 and SpiceJet 14. Across all airlines, 244 of the 263 findings were Level 2, the less severe category, and the DGCA said a larger airline will naturally have more findings. That makes Star Air's number harder to dismiss, because its fleet is a fraction of the size of those with fewer. The published figures do not say what the findings were about.

Star Air is not an IATA member, so we cannot confirm that it has passed an IOSAIOSAThe IATA Operational Safety Audit, an international audit of an airline's safety management and operations. Every IATA member must pass it.More in the glossary audit. India itself holds FAA Category 1FAA IASAThe US FAA's check of whether a country's aviation regulator meets ICAO standards. Category 1 means it does; Category 2 means it does not.More in the glossary, and no Indian airline is on the EU Air Safety ListEU Air Safety ListThe European Commission's list of airlines banned or restricted from flying in EU airspace because they do not meet international safety standards.More in the glossary.

The fleet: from ERJ-145s to E175s

Star Air began in 2019 with 50-seat ERJ-145s, an older and smaller type, and has since moved to the Embraer E175, with 12 business and 64 economy seats. In May 2026, Air Data News counted eight E175s, all leased, and reported that Star Air appeared to have phased out the ERJ-145s, although the airline's website still lists them. Star Air publishes no ages for its aircraft.

The fleet is still changing. Air Data News also linked Star Air to two used, 12-year-old E190s from the lessor TrueNoord, flown before by KLM Cityhopper and Eastern Airways. Neither company had confirmed the deal. In late 2025, Star Air said it planned to grow to 50 aircraft by 2030.

Second-hand regional jets are normal for an airline of this size and are not a safety problem when maintained to the same standard. Star Air and HAL announced in 2025 that they would set up a maintenance unit for Embraer jets in India.

Small airports, short runways

Most of Star Air's 32 destinations are small airports: Belagavi, Kalaburagi, Bidar, Kolhapur, Nanded, Jamnagar and, since 2026, Mundra. Several have short runways and fewer landing aids than the metro airports. In late August 2025 the DGCA closed Nanded airport, and Star Air could resume flights there only after the regulator cleared it again in September. From June to September, monsoon storms over Karnataka and Maharashtra bring low cloud and heavy rain.

Flying Star Air

• Check the aircraft type. Star Air's website asks passengers to check which type flies the route. On the E175, the business cabin has one seat on one side of the aisle and two on the other; economy has two on each side.
• Plan for weather delays in the monsoon. At small airports without instrument approaches, poor visibility can mean a hold or a diversion.
• Allow a spare day for connections. With fewer than ten jets, one technical problem can cancel a flight, and the next one may be a day later.

How we scored it

The clean accident record (87) carries the score. Oversight (67) is the Indian level without a confirmed IOSAIOSAThe IATA Operational Safety Audit, an international audit of an airline's safety management and operations. Every IATA member must pass it.More in the glossary audit, and the fleet (66) is a current type on used leases of unpublished age. Serious incidents (62) reflect the high number of audit findings for a small airline. For India's other regional airlines, see Alliance Air and Fly91.