Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to investigate the influence of mechanical surface treatments on the surface layer properties and the fatigue performance of the aircraft alloys Al 7075-T73 and Ti-6Al-4V Design/methodology/approach – Laser peening without coating (LPwC), shot peening (SP), ultrasonic shot peening (USP) and ball burnishing (BB) were applied and the resulting changes in surface roughness and residual stress-depth profiles were evaluated. Fatigue performance of both alloys was tested in rotating beam loading (R=-1) on hourglass-shaped specimens and the results were compared with the electrolytically polished (EP) reference conditions. Findings – All studied mechanical surface treatments led to pronounced increases in fully reversed fatigue lives and fatigue strengths in both Al 7075-T73 and Ti-6Al-4V. Originality/value – To the authors' knowledge, this is the first paper that compares fatigue performance of a wide variety of mechanically surface treated conditions in two aircraft alloys.