Incheon International Airport, Seoul's main gateway, won the world's best airport prize for a record 11th consecutive year at an award ceremony in Australia on Tuesday (local time).

The airport grabbed the annual Airport Service Quality Award, presented by the Airports Council International, as the best in the business. Incheon scored 4.978 points out of 5.00 and extended its own record winning streak to 11 years.

Incheon also shared first place with Changi Airport in Singapore as the best airport in the Asia-Pacific region. They also together topped the list of the "over 40 million" category for large airports handling at least 40 million travelers annually.

The ASQ Award, first launched in 2006, was based on some 550,000 passenger surveys delivered to 268 airports worldwide, the ACI said.

It covered 34 key service areas under eight categories that include access, check-in, security, food and beverage.

"Winning the highest honor at the ASQ Award for 11 straight years is something no other airport in the world has achieved so far," said Chung Il-young, chief of the Incheon International Airport Corp.

He said the airport will make another leap forward as the world's leading airport by expanding facilities and providing high-tech services.

"We will provide customized services to our passengers by using mobile and location-based services," Chung said.

Still, Chung said he is not in a position to fully enjoy the accolade, referring to the recent series of airport-related security problems that set off alarm bells.

In January, two Chinese nationals snuck into the country without being noticed by immigration officials or picked up by the airport's security systems. Later in the same month, a Vietnamese transfer passenger forced his way through the gate of an unmanned automatic immigration checkpoint without being noticed.

All the people that entered South Korea illegally were later arrested in the country and ordered to be deported.

Chung said the airport is putting utmost efforts into blocking loopholes in its security system.

Gimpo International Airport in western Seoul also topped the list of the airports handling passengers between 15 million and 25 million annually for a sixth consecutive year.

The award ceremony was held as part of the 2016 ACI Asia-Pacific Regional Assembly in Gold Coast, Australia. (Yonhap)