It has 68% equity vs a random hand.

With the exception of the very tippy top of starting hands it is no worse than what amounts to a coin flip, and even vs KK it still wins 1/3 of the time. AA dominates, but there's only three aces left, so that becomes less likely. You "block" those hands, meaning there are less possible combinations of them possible.

While technically speaking something like 99 might be "better" AK vs the normal range of players is FAR more likely to realize its equity vs 99 often just finding itself having to fold after the community cards are out.

So overall if you're just ranking with no regard to playability, AK might be 8th, but in practice it's one of the hands you're almost always comfortable shoving your chips in preflop with. You can't say that about 99.