With the rapid development of China’s civil aviation industry, the position of hub airports in civil aviation has been improved. However, the classification of hub airports is undefined, with strategic planning insufficient and the functional orientation seriously homogenized, which makes the vicious competition between airports fierce. Therefore, hub airports are classified according to the collaborative development to achieve differentiated and hierarchical development of various airports. This paper took the 40 hub airports mentioned in the National Civil Airport Layout Plan(2017) as research objects, and the classification problem was solved by methods of three-stage and super-efficiency DEA, clustering analysis and BP neural network. The gradient classification of hub airports was carried out, and the collaborative development strategy based on functional orientation was proposed to promote the sustainable development of aviation industry.