In mid-2023, British Airways’ CEO announced that the airline planned to update the interiors of its Airbus A380s, which is also where we’ll see the debut of the carrier’s new first class suite. 2026 is finally supposed to be the year where we see this project start, so what’s the latest on this? I’d like…
Continue reading: British Airways Retrofitting A380s With New Cabins, 110(!!) Business Seats
Share your questions, experiences, and thoughts below.
With 110 seats, biz class will become less intimate and more like economy with a bigger seat! Knowing BA, they won't add any staff to that bigger cabin in order to make the economy-like experience more realistic!
For what it’s worth, Air Canada’s 777-300ERs have 450 seats. This is the highest Business Class seat count I’ve ever seen
A very fair appraisal of the current BA F&J seats Ben. After hundreds of flying hours, I can attest to the comfort and practicality of the new J seat.
As for the current F cabin seat on the BA A380, it was never our first choice and I welcome an upgrade. Therefore, I will not knock it until I’ve tried it. That said, we will now find it difficult to replace our first choice future outward bound AF LP and return from SIN on SQ.
One is minded to believe that 1990Bots, LHR-JFK might just be on the minds of the BA bean counters too. Perhaps all those J seats are destined to accommodate U.S. posteriors …. 🙂
Jolly hockey sticks and …. Tally Ho!
Your ignorance is only your bliss ….
Just because you are unfamiliar with the subject products does not mean that others are as ignorant as you are Uncle Tom, yes?
However, I am certain that Ben, is grateful for your click, do you know what Uncle Tom? Clicks mean points and points mean flight reviews, thereby, for the proletariat you might get your cattle class reviews, yes?
Historical fact …. BA was the first carrier to introduce the fully flat seat/bed platform in the 1990’s.
Historical fact …. the current BA J seat was first introduced in 2019. I can attest to hundreds of hours of very comfortable sleep in the BA F and J seats …. what is your claim then Kraut? ….. Ever or never?
Khati, there are no more “Economy” seats than those thousands of seats fitted in the U.S. airlines. Please tell us which, in your experience, you think are currently better?
Thinking about your suggestion rationally 1990Bot. Should BA deploy the new layout A380 on the JFK route, your U.S. carriers might not like it very much.
I wouldn't be surprised to see some updates and other enhancements to the Club Suites. Maybe a slight change in the colours, finishes, and trim, 4K displays, wireless charging, even enhanced storage.
I don't think we'll see BA send many A380s to the US, if any. Both they and AA need frequency in US-LHR slots and definitely not 200+ economy seats except possibly at the highest peak of the summer. Multiple daily flights with somewhat fewer J/F seats each will still likely work better for them.
Aero the member...
Aero the guest...
you never really know who you're talking to since "someone" seems to log in and out of other user accounts while changing their syntax constantly under the same username...
And now "aero" is using very negative derogatory racial terms for other users. How classy...
Club Suite on the upper deck will be pretty tight due to the width of that cabin, unless they somehow work the foot cubby into the existing side storage cabinet.
Is it comforting for you JulieBot, having so many OMAAT ‘loggers’ living rent free inside your tiny pin head drive? o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o. Ooops! Reached capacity already …. 🙂
Ben, however, will appreciate your contribution to his points collection.
110 seats?! BA should introduce a US-style upgrade program to fill them and make $$$
Business Class seats at this point are like smartphones. People keep complaining that new phones "aren't innovative", but at this point, wtf else do you want a phone to do. What more can someone possibly want from a Business Class seat than a large bed, good screen, and privacy
I know of no Delta cabin configurations with this amount of premium space. Ingesting for the "worlds most premium airline" no?? Hmm. Perhaps they are not so as what they describe (actually (delusionally and wrongly wish) they were. Tim, et tu,
About time BA had the oddest Business Class next to Virgin Airlines weird silo seats. I flew them 2 years ago and Flight Attendant kept apologizing for the substandard business class.
That's an absolutely massive business class cabin... I wonder how they're going to staff that to be able to do business level service for that many customers.
Excited to see the update though! I thought it was weird that their flagship jumbo had such an out-of-date cabin
BA & AF lead the commercial aviation industry with Concorde, over half a century ago. Then some three decades ago BA lead the world with innovative seat and cabin design. The U.S. aviation industry is still playing catchup and cannot hold a candle to BA to this day.
Customer stratification surveys by Forbes, CNT and other U.S. based customer survey organisations, all place BA streets ahead of the U.S. pack. The U.S. airlines can only just compete with the likes of Ryanair …. voted the world’s worst airline according to recent media reports. Furthermore, the likes of Boeing, some U.S. engine and seat manufacturers cannot even deliver on their contracts. Get a grip USA!
Before the brainwashed U.S. based BA critics start pounding their keyboards to comment, perhaps they ought to educate themselves and stop being brainwashed by their tedious masters, yes?
AC's high density 777-300ER does have that many seats with only 28 seats in business class, 24 seats in Premium Economy and 398 seats in Economy
To roll out the new premium business lite cabin with a massive amount of seats BA will initiate a new premium surcharge fee of 3000 DOLLARS per passenger due to popular demand and a 100% increase in seat fees
QR is using "almost same" super diamond seats on the upper deck of their a380s. I didn't see any problem with the width of those product. So I think Club Suite will work on upper deck.
The updated A380 will I am sure be great but best avoided to the US. We went to the US in 2023 for a road trip. Our A380 flight was late and came in behind another A380. The time it took to clear immigration was well over 2 hours. We also went on an A380 to Miami at Christmas 2024. This time no plane landed at a similar time but it would have taken us another good couple of hours but luckily they reconfigured the line and we ended up right at the front of queue and cleared immigration in just a few minutes.
Hooray! Finally a British Airways change we can be enthusiastically proud about. I really hope it delivers something as decent as it looks in those renderings. It doesn't look industry leading, but at least it'll be competitive and better than the current state of affairs.
106 biz seats, great. Just a larger chance to be ignored.
Ehem. It’s still lie-flat. Upstairs. Still better than “World Traveler” or whatever they’re calling long-haul economy these days.
I mean, he is right , today you won't be ignored in J because you're always looking directly at teh face of the person diagonal from you in that ridiculous set-up
That first class seat looks a lot like the current Emirates F seat to me. Not a bad things really, and a large upgrade on the current seat but it is interesting that the evolution they're performing in F is to move to a seat that Emirates has flown for well over 10 years now.
For Premium Economy the main improvement they need isn't hard product but soft product. There's almost no differentiation between economy and the biggest change they can make would be to have dedicated crew and catering (like Emirates do)
BA has quite an improved Premium Economy soft product, as the two entrees being business class dishes. Also I find the current seat very comfortable. I am not sure if the future hard shell seat will match the current comfort.
The Premium Economy on the top deck of the A380 is a great experience.
Almost forgot BA even still operates the a380. Saw it in MIA (and SFO?), but it’s never been in the NYC-area (with BA on regularly scheduled service). Eh, that’s fine; JFK did used to get the Concorde… I guess near-hourly 787, 777 is fine.
The club suite needed a v2.0 and this looks perfectly fine. Amazing how the existing club suites are showing their age. My guess is that it will feel like the existing club suites on the A350 (which definitely feel a bit narrower... probably because they are a bit narrower).
Nice that BA will keep it's 12 A380s around. Will be interesting to see how they deploy them once they actually are up to standard.
I'm not a fan of herringbone seating. It looks and feels awkward. Plus, most business class seats that align with the fuselage seem roomier and can have larger video monitors.
I believe BA will be the first airline to have reverse herringbone seats on the upper deck? I have long been thinking if a reverse herringbone seat could make use of the wider knee level compared to the shoulder level on the upper deck, i.e. the space currently used for the windowside storage compartments, and make the footwell larger. Unfortunately from the rendering seems like BA is keeping that storage. Had it removed those, the cabin width at footwell level would be comparable to 787/350, instead of the 330 level as of now.
"British Airways will debut an all-new first class product, featuring proper doors"
Not just doors, but PROPER doors!
Don't know why, but I find this blog's preoccupation with airline seat-doors to be so funny. lol
Underwhelming (yawn). I’ve flown over 50 long haul flights in business class. Traveling is exciting and aspirational for young people. High income working professionals and retirees want to travel in comfort.
At this point the seasoned avgeek is flying international first class exclusively. (Not BA though)
Chill out, gentlemen, jeez. BA is BA, it's never going to be exciting or amazing. But they are keeping the A380 for a while and are replacing obsolete seats with decent modern day seats. That's pretty much the absolute top you can expect of them, and by those meager standards they are more then delivering. Kudos, I'd say.
Any clarity on a retrofit timetable for the 380? Looking at July 2027 for a F-class flight. Probably toon soon?
BA was never going to be the world's most "wow" seats. But the size of the J cabin should at least mean there is decent award availability on the A380 routes.
Award ‘availability’ was hardly the problem with BA… it’s always been the surcharges. (Like, ‘oh, cool 55K in J TATL… plus $1,500…’)
They obviously think they can sell them all for cash rather than points, or they wouldn’t bother installing such a massive cabin.
That also looks to be the new largest Premium Economy cabin after SQ reduce PY on their ULRs.
But those boxy small and thick IFE screens are over a decade old. Collins should have updated the design with the larger slimmer IFEs from Elements.
Having flown on two full 777 J cabins recently, despite their best efforts, it's been a disorganized mess. I worry about service on these larger A380 cabins.
I am not sure "World's largest business cabin" is the plus point they seem to think.
I travelled on a 777-300 fairly recently, and service was super long for business class. The whole (large) cabin was being served from a single galley, and so the cabin crew spent most of their time running up and down the aisle rather than attending to customers.
Admittedly I was near the rear of the biz section, but I couldn't even get a second glass of wine with my meal.
So unless they come up with a better plan, it is going to be a mess
Nick.
They keep same slow service design and carry on slowly in their calm 787-8 Club suites.
It’s a huge improvement across the board. You mentioned that the BA seats might be tight on the upper deck — I can’t imagine it being all that bad since QR also has Super Diamond seats on their upper deck J. Anecdotally, the A380 felt more cramped than their A350s with Super Diamond seats when I flew both back to back. But — at least according to Aerolopa — the A380 actually has an extra inch of pitch over them. They’re the same width but the A350 has a slightly longer bed (82in vs 80in). The lower ceilings, smaller bins and windows will definitely give the impression it’s less spacious. But absolutely a solid product (and will be even more so with BA given the added privacy/newer everything).
Once flew KE’s A380 on the upper deck, which is also a full-business configuration. Priority boarding lane for 94 C passengers was already tiring enough. Meal service felt very much like economy, while crews were trying their best serving 94 business passengers. It was a quite an experience!
Happy to see this project rolling (I thought it was due to start months ago).
I do wonder about the cabin crew staffing levels needed to properly service 106 business passengers...