American Airlines has announced plans to invest in its lounge setup in Chicago, as the airline continues to try to grow there, and make up ground that has been lost to United.
Continue reading: New American Admirals Club Coming To Chicago, As Airline Grows At Airport
Share your questions, experiences, and thoughts below.
Honestly surprised by the design direction here. It felt like American had finally landed on a cohesive, elevated language for its new lounges—DCA being a great example of something warm, refined, and genuinely sophisticated. By comparison, these Chicago renderings read more like a Brooklyn pizzeria than a flagship airline lounge, which only reinforces the lingering sense that AA still isn’t quite sure what it wants to be.
I hope this inspires United to improve their (non-Polaris) United Clubs at ORD. There's currently only 1 lounge in the updated style (in Concourse C) and the remaining lounges in B and Terminal 2 are showing their age and the food and beverage options vary by location, which is annoying. In any case, all of the food at United Clubs in Chicago is horrible...so improving that alone would be a massive benefit.
Ironically (don't tell Tim D), I believe Delta actually has the nicest regular lounge at ORD (excluding Polaris given access limitations) with their newish one in Terminal 5. I haven't been but the pictures look great and Delta's food is certainly better than that offered in a United Club...
Maybe one more reason about the poor offerings at flagship lounge is that American is too generous for flagship lounge entrance requirements that barred them from generating economic benefits without cutting the service. They allow foreign airlines' sapphire and own platinum in when flying long-haul. While UA only allows *A business (not even own 1K when flying long-haul Y or PY) and DL only allows close partners' business.
I am down for FL asking for emerald to enter. would still be the most generous one even after.
I love the DL lounge at T5. I’ve been to all the AC lounges, including Flagship, and UC lounges at ORD and DL is by far the best and it’s not even close. The food, drinks, decor, and amount of space is leaps better than AA and UA. That being said, I haven’t been to the Polaris lounge at ORD so maybe that is better than DL but I won’t know till I try it.
The Flagship Lounge is following standard OneWorld access rules for business class lounges, which allows OW Sapphires access (with the carve out for requiring international long haul for AS and AA Sapphires).
Ben I get where you are coming from about UA having a superior lounge game in ORD, but I think it's a bit more nuanced as a super regular lounge user at ORD (UA 1K, BA GGL, AA ExPlat).
Is the Polaris lounge better, sure. But the Flagship is significantly more accessible, is a very nice OW J lounge, isn't usually over-crowded, and ^this last piece is huge for me^ has significantly better hours ^and^ AA extends lounge hours during irrops while UA doesn't (except if LH is paying for their late flight at the B lounge at the end). This make a big difference when connecting onto a late bank.
There are similar comps to be made UA Club vs Admirals Club there. I tend to like the atmosphere of the UA Clubs (especially their bars) better but AAs food and hours are now better, and generally they are less crowded.
Do I miss the old intimate OWE K lounge, absolutely...hint hint AA . But to write off AAs offerings is a bit too much. I think AA has a credible, if uphill, case in ORD and am absolutely loving the competition for premium developing.
Don't worry. I know about the ORD Sky Club.
DL's food in SkyClubs is always better than AA and UA's standard clubs.
And the DL ORD club was built to serve alliance partners in Terminal 5.
specific to AA, as I have said all along, AA is in ORD to stay and they believe they can not only withstand whatever UA throws at AA but AA can also inflict a lot of pain on UA who thinks that AA is just going to roll over and walk away.
Competition is good and no metro area needs it more than Chicago.
@Samar
Then you can ask why Qatar doesn’t open up its Al Mourjan and Al Safwa lounges to status holders.
Alliances are not as strong as before, and that’s why Oneworld no longer gatekeeps their emerald status. Meanwhile, AA always has a choice to define Club as business lounge and Flagship as premium lounge.
That’s nice to hear! See, this is something tangible from the alleged ‘turf war’ hype. Without lower fares (or nicer amenities, such as this) it felt a little manufactured. Now, we’re actually getting somewhere… real question, how’s ORD_is_my_second, etc. feel about it?
"United claims it’s profitable in Chicago, while claiming that American is losing massive amounts of money in Chicago"
Has AA issued any counterclaim to this?
It's on UA to show the proof, they are the ones making the claim. I can claim that my asshole is profitable in Chicago.
AA gains nothing by revealing this information.
My situation is quite similar and I agree with everything you described. And as a heavy user of the Flagship Lounge in ORD, I wasn't aware of the hours extensions during irrops.. and sadly had no idea of the OWE K lounge, I missed it and now I have to learn about it
I question Kirby's data that United is wildly profitable in Chicago while American loses money. I fly both airlines out of O'Hare regularly and while United has the better hard product (and their flight attendants and gate agents are a lot less cranky), both airlines are similarly priced for flights and planes are generally at capacity. Unless United has a wildly different cost structure (they don't), I question the statement and chalk it up to marketing spin.
True; I dropped my Admiral's Club membership after ten years. The final straw in the H/K lounge was that all the decent food and half the space went to the Flagship Lounge on the second floor (which is admittedly decent), it left the regular club crowded and the food offerings underwhelming.
This lounge was announced in April of 2024 when the renovation of Terminal 3 was announced. The GC's website that went live in April 2024 listed the new lounge as one of the new amenities.
Clearly they are playing a PR war as part of this AA vs USA at ORD and recycling old news as new news...or at least dropping more details on the lounge space as it approaches closer to opening.
https://www.ord21.com/news/Pages/article.aspx?newsid=40
https://www.cot3.com/about-the-project