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Air quality index (AQI) is an index based on calculating daily index values for pollutants and reporting the value that corresponds to the criteria pollutant with the highest index value. The index is used to communicate air quality levels to the public at any specific time and place. The AQI has been criticized for many reasons, which includes its inability to quantitatively account for the combined effects of exposure to multiple pollutants, it does not capture low-level effects and in some cases, health components are not included in the models. This has encouraged the development of multiple pollutant indices which are commonly called air quality health index (AQHI) that adequately captures the joint effects of multiple air pollutants on health outcomes. The AQHI is developed using multiple pollutants and obtaining estimates from each pollutants. It assumes an additive or overall effect to produce an index; this ensures the contribution to adverse health effects of each pollutant is considered. In this review, ten studies on the association between AQHIs and health outcomes were identified but only two compare health effects of AQHIs with those of AQIs. A Chinese study found that an IQR increase in AQHI vs AQI represented 3.61% (95%CI: 2.85% - 4.37%) vs 2.71% (95% CI: 1.98% - 3.43%), 3.73% (95% CI: 2.18% - 5.27%) vs 2.12% (95% CI: 0.63% - 3.61%) and 4.19% (95% CI: 2.87% - 5.52%) vs 1.88% (95% CI: 0.60% - 3.17%) increase in mortality, respiratory and cardiovascular disease respectively. An American study found that the AQHI was positively associated with respiratory emergency visits in low and high ozone-seasons compared to the AQI, which was only significant for low ozone-season. The AQHI demonstrated stronger effects per IQR. Whether AQHI also capture a larger burden attributable to daily exposure to air pollution will be further investigated.