Lufthansa is in the process of rolling out its new long haul cabin concept, known as Allegris. This includes a new business class product (being installed on newly delivered Airbus A350s and Boeing 787s), as well as a new first class product (being installed on newly delivered Airbus A350s).
Lufthansa’s rollout of its new premium cabins has been rather challenging, to put it mildly. The airline announced these products in 2017, and the first plane started flying with new cabins around seven years later. Specifically, Lufthansa Allegris business class debuted as of May 2024, on newly delivered aircraft.
Lufthansa has now taken delivery of half a dozen jets featuring these cabins, and they’re now consistently flying certain routes. Anyway, there’s an exciting update, as Lufthansa has announced entry into service plans for its new first class.
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New Lufthansa first class faced production delays
Lufthansa’s entire Allegris concept was already delayed considerably due to supply chain issues. Both Airbus A350-900s and Boeing 787-9s were ready to go into service, but due to issues with the interiors (in terms of getting them installed and certified), many of these planes were in storage.
So far, Lufthansa has put five new A350s into service, featuring Allegris cabins. The catch is that the portion of the cabin where first class will be located is currently empty. Or more specifically, you’ll just find a row of economy seats in this section, but they aren’t used for passengers (these needed to be installed to get the aircraft certified).
Flying around a plane with a partially empty cabin isn’t ideal, but I suppose it’s better than just keeping these planes grounded.
New Lufthansa first class launch timeline
A couple of weeks ago, Lufthansa took delivery of its sixth new Airbus A350-900 since rolling out the Allegris concept, with the registration code D-AIXW, and it has the Allegris first class cabin installed!
Since being delivered, the jet hasn’t yet operated commercial service. However, the airline has now announced the first routes to get the new product. Lufthansa will fly its A350-900 with Allegris first class to Bangalore (BLR) as of November 9, 2024, and to Mumbai (BOM) as of November 15, 2024. Since there will initially be a single A350 with the new cabins, the airline will alternate on which days the plane flies to each destination, so expect service every other day at first.
The plan is for the first five newly delivered A350s to progressively be retrofitted with first class cabins, with the plan being for that to happen over the winter season.
Lufthansa won’t initially sell new first class seats
With Lufthansa shortly putting its A350 with first class into service, what are the plans for actually selling those seats? Lufthansa won’t initially be selling first class on this jet. Instead, the airline will initially seat some business class passengers in the cabin:
- The goal is to get at least two A350s with Allegris first class (if not more) into service before formally selling first class, to account for the possibility of aircraft swaps
- Initially Lufthansa will invite select guests to select these seats; presumably they would go to top-tier Miles & More HON Circle members, and it’s also possible that the airline may sell these seats at an extra fee
This general strategy isn’t unlike how Lufthansa hasn’t yet been charging for Allegris business class seat assignments, even though that’s part of the long term plan. Currently Lufthansa plans to start charging for Allegris business class seat assignments as of late March 2025.
Why I’m skeptical about Lufthansa’s Allegris first class
As before, I’m a bit skeptical about Lufthansa’s new first class product. While the window seats look perfectly nice, the double suite in the center makes no sense whatsoever.
Sure, the concept of having a space for two people to fly together sounds great, but it doesn’t look spacious at all, and offers limited flexibility in terms of one person being able to sleep while the other person stays up. There’s not even an armrest between the two seats.
Furthermore, maximizing revenue for a cabin with just two standard seats seems challenging. You want to create a first class product that customers can reliably book, but how do you do that when there are just two regular first class seats to book? And if no one books the double suite, at what point do you sell that to a single passenger?
As much as I’m happy to see Lufthansa introducing new premium products, it seems to me like the airline way over-engineered this. I mean, Lufthansa is also promoting how it has a handful of different kinds of business class seats in its Allegris cabin. Is that much choice really a good thing in terms of managing passenger expectations?
Bottom line
Lufthansa has experienced significant production delays with getting its Allegris product into service. While the airline now has Allegris business class on five Airbus A350s that are already in service, we’re finally seeing the introduction of Allegris first class on the sixth jet, and it just joined the fleet.
In the coming days it will start flying to Bangalore and Mumbai on alternating days. The airline doesn’t initially plan to sell first class on this aircraft, until the fleet is scaled a bit. I’m curious to see what the long term strategy is…
What do you make of the introduction of Lufthansa’s new Allegris first class?
Even traveling together I would not want that middle seat. I regularly fly with another person and we eat at different times, we sleep at different times, we watch different movies... this seat would fail completely.
The middle seats look great to us as a couple- we would not want to waste seat space on a divider. I would book these in a heartbeat. Not everyone flies solo.
AF: Lets standardise our interiors on 1-2-1 Business Class
BA: Shit, we should standardise our interiors on 1-2-1 Business Class
KLM: I know, lets standardise our interiors on 1-2-1 Business Class
AA: Lets standardise our interiors on 1-2-1 Business Class, everyone's doing it.
LH: No, we're doing to differentiate our airplanes with 5 different business class seats and a first class suite with a sex swing.
It's pretty clear to me that they will just sell the First class cabin as 3 seats. Withholding the middle seat for 2 people booking it makes no sense from a spoilage risk standpoint and it is a subpar product when 2 people are using it.
If you sell it as 3 seats, you then have the option of adding an ancillary fee for the middle seat if a second passenger wants to sit there but it would be nowhere near the cost of 2 First class seats.
I seriously cannot fathom how stupid the design is for the middle suite, how nobody was thinking well shit maybe we need to make a door from the other side so the passengers wouldn't need to climb other each other to get out?
Over each other*
Is it known if this will be the configuration on the 777X as well? The fuselage is wider, so perhaps it will be in a more traditional (and better) 1-2-1 config?
Nope. There are rumors that Swiss will be installing two rows of F in the 777s, but I haven't seen anyting about lufthansa.
Do we know yet if any of these seats will have gaspers? Lufthansa is notorious for keeping their cabins at tropical temps and no amount of space or caviar can make that pleasant.