Here’s a positive and overdue development, if you ask me…
In this post:
Air France HOP business class changes coming October 2025
In May 2024, Air France announced plans to overhaul the cabins of its Embraer E190s, operated by regional subsidiary HOP. The good news is that this means the cabins will be much more modern, with all seats getting a smartphone holder, a cup holder, adjustable headrests, and USB-A and USB-C outlets.
However, as planes are reconfigured, they’re also going from 100 seats to 110 seats, so the cabin is being densified. There’s a silver lining to this, though. Historically, Air France HOP has not blocked adjacent seats in business class on the Embraer jets, meaning business class passengers have had to deal with a seat mate, just like in economy.
That will soon be changing. As of October 1, 2025, Air France HOP will begin blocking aisle seats in business class on Embraer jets, meaning each passenger will get a pair of seats. This applies on both the Embraer E170s and E190s, and it also applies regardless of whether a particular flight features the new cabins or not.
Up until now, if you looked at the business class seat map, you’d see something like the below…
…while as of October 1, 2025, you’ll see something like the below.
For what it’s worth, as of now seat maps have only been updated through March 28, 2026. No, that doesn’t mean Air France will backtrack as of March 29. Instead, the airline has so far just updated its schedule through the end of the IATA winter season, so expect IATA summer season updates in the coming months.
This makes a material difference to the experience
Intra-Europe business class isn’t ordinarily much to get excited about. One of the primary selling points is generally that you get an empty seat next to you, so at least you have a bit more personal space.
With that in mind, no longer having a seat mate when flying on these regional jets is a great development, and will also make for a more consistent experience between aircraft types. A customer shouldn’t have to worry about whether their flight is operated by a regional jet or mainline aircraft, since pricing is the same, and many markets have service from different types of aircraft.
For planes with 2-2 layouts, European carriers seem divided as to whether or not they block seats in business class. To state the obvious, it’s more costly to block a seat in a 2-2 layout than in a 3-3 layout (since each passenger is getting an extra seat, rather than half an extra seat). Among European carriers:
- On one end of the spectrum, Lufthansa Group blocks adjacent business class seats on all regional jets, on Austrian, Lufthansa, and SWISS
- On the other end of the spectrum, IAG doesn’t block adjacent business class seats on all regional jets, including on British Airways and Iberia
- Now we have Air France-KLM in the middle with Air France blocking adjacent business class seats as of this fall, and KLM not blocking adjacent seats
Bottom line
As of October 2025, Air France HOP will begin blocking adjacent business class seats on all Embraer E170 and E190 flights. This was promised back when plans were announced for these planes to get new cabins, which includes installing 10 additional seats.
I’m happy to see this policy finally implemented, as this was a weak point of the premium experience for what I’d otherwise consider to be (by far) Europe’s most luxurious global carrier.
What do you make of Air France rolling out regional jet seat blocking?
AF is usually 3 across but in biz- they block middle seat so now doing only 2 across?
The Embraers don't have middle seats.
Back in the olden days, USAir / US Airways had convertible seats on some of their narrowbodies that were 3 x 3. Depending on the number of domestic first seats sold; the seats were convertible to a 2 x 2 configuration, making the seats more comfortable. That didn't really help with legroom, but it did help with width of the seat.
I think I just dated myself.
Lufthansa’s A300 also had convertible seats.
If you google Aviation Photo #0333899 you should be able to see a photo.
I remember that too ! it was when they were in bed with British Airways and were trying to do a European biz class in the USA. Did not work well at all and people hated it !
Would be nicer if Europe stopped being a poverty continent and their airlines started offering an actual business class product. As someone who is 6'5", these fake business classes are a joke
So will these seats be physically blocked or just not booked? If not physically, how many people are going to try to move up to them?
Sometimes physically blocked by a table. Sometimes not. So far I have not seen that somebody tried to move up
Honestly, I’m somewhat confused as to why proper business class seats aren’t used on RJs. Assuming an E-jet has 2-2 in Y and 1-2 in proper J, the airlines would gain a seat compared to blocking the aisle seat which would leave them with just 1-1 seating.
Because during the peak holiday periods they zero business class out and sell 4 seats per row in expensive economy booking classes and make more money.
I remember the nasty surprise I had the first time I flew AY J on an Embraer when my seatmate sat down. The EU should force them to call this premium economy.
does the EU have the same 1:50 FA:PAX ratio requirement? If it does, its a little weird that AF would reconfigure to 110 minus 6 blocked seats. That would mean an extra FA for only 4 seats. Or is it 110 total incl the blocked J seats?
European regulations vary depending on whether a narrow body or wide bodied aircraft.
Generally speaking, on a narrow body aircraft it is 1 FA per 50 SEATS not per 50 pax. So for example if you have an A320 with 180 seats and there are only ten passengers on board it would still require 4 FA. There are some variances as well with some aircraft requiring additional crew (ie the A321 with 8 doors needs 5 crew).
If it's like the US, then it's per-seat. The number of pax boarded or sold-to is irrelevant. So if the airline has 51 seats, it doesn't matter if they (even permanently) choose not to sell one, they'd need the extra attendant.
If they choose to permanently not sell it, they can actually block the seat in a way that it's not counted towards the limit.
This includes visibly blocking the seat, but it must also be changed on the aircraft's type certificate. So, similar to paper-reducing MTOW, it's something you can change, but it's not something you can change every day.
Although I don't completely understand the logic, KLM does it for the 737-900s. They...
If they choose to permanently not sell it, they can actually block the seat in a way that it's not counted towards the limit.
This includes visibly blocking the seat, but it must also be changed on the aircraft's type certificate. So, similar to paper-reducing MTOW, it's something you can change, but it's not something you can change every day.
Although I don't completely understand the logic, KLM does it for the 737-900s. They physically have 192 seats, but have it registered as a 188-seat aircraft. The middle seats on rows 1+2 are really blocked. The middle seats from row 3 can be used as economy seats.
easyJet also did it a while back with their 156-seat A319s: when they had a shortage of staff, they blocked 6 seats on the certificate to operate it with 3 FA's. Later, they unblocked the seats.
Regarding Air France-KLM:
My understanding is, that SAS will not be blocking adjacent seats on their CRJ900 when Business Class will be re-introduced in October. (?)
What is stopping Europe from having proper business class seats?
I understand the flexibility of swapping aircraft, but if you have routes that you market as business class, then just keep those aircraft on those routes?
It doesn’t have anything to do with “swapping aircraft”.
It has something to do with remaining flexible until virtually the last minute with how many business class seats the airline wants to sell in relation to economy class.
The curtain can be moved forward a row to turn 4 business class seats into 6 economy class seats any time. Or the other way around…
… to be precise for the Embraer this would be turning 2 Business Class seats into 4 Economy Class seats and vv….
… to be precise for the Embraer this would be turning 2 Business Class seats into 4 Economy Class seats and vv….
Ok so it is exactly about having flexibility, thanks!
Because there is ZERO competitive advantage for an airline to lose all the flexibility of a convertible cabin when every one of your competitors is taking advantage of convertible economy seats.
Some airlines tried - Aegean, Air Serbia for example. Before realising no one was prepared to pay the inflated prices and they retrofitted back to eurobusiness seats.
The BIGGEST short haul intra Europe cabins are not BA or AF or LH it is Ryanair,...
Because there is ZERO competitive advantage for an airline to lose all the flexibility of a convertible cabin when every one of your competitors is taking advantage of convertible economy seats.
Some airlines tried - Aegean, Air Serbia for example. Before realising no one was prepared to pay the inflated prices and they retrofitted back to eurobusiness seats.
The BIGGEST short haul intra Europe cabins are not BA or AF or LH it is Ryanair, Easyjet. The loco's rule the sky within Europe.
IMHO I think eurobusiness ONLY really exists to offer feeder traffic to/from long haul flights. For example, if someone makes an online search from SFO to CDG in business class results on BA or LH would not return if they did not also have 'business class' on the intra Europe segment.
The argument about connections makes no sense as Eurobusiness is offered by airlines that have few (e.g. Aegean, who incidentally haven't had dedicated business seating) or even no (e.g. Air Albania) long-haul passengers.
European airlines should not be able to market this as business class.
European airlines really need to catch up with the rest of the world on business class. Those who do not offer an open seat next to the occupied seat, when each seat is an economy class seat otherwise, should definitely be prohibited by EU law from advertising it as anything but economy.
The real travesty though is how US airlines are allowed to call what they sell "First Class". It's business class (with the...
European airlines really need to catch up with the rest of the world on business class. Those who do not offer an open seat next to the occupied seat, when each seat is an economy class seat otherwise, should definitely be prohibited by EU law from advertising it as anything but economy.
The real travesty though is how US airlines are allowed to call what they sell "First Class". It's business class (with the exception of the rare remaining AA 777 with actual first and, although it's a stretch, the "first" class on A321T's). The First Class nomenclature is an outright lie otherwise in the US market.
"The First Class nomenclature is an outright lie otherwise in the US market."
Calm down. It's strictly domestic and transborder nomenclature, left over from the days when US airline passengers wouldn't have gotten a much different seat on a longhaul flight either.
On today's regional international flights, nearly all US airlines will sell those same seats as "business class," in part to conform with more typical international standards. Delta will sometimes even sell them...
"The First Class nomenclature is an outright lie otherwise in the US market."
Calm down. It's strictly domestic and transborder nomenclature, left over from the days when US airline passengers wouldn't have gotten a much different seat on a longhaul flight either.
On today's regional international flights, nearly all US airlines will sell those same seats as "business class," in part to conform with more typical international standards. Delta will sometimes even sell them as just premium economy, like they do to Iceland.
… and US airlines should not be able to market their domestic business class as “First class” if there’s no lounge access and no caviar served onboard.
How much leg room is being sacrficed for this?
Having a free adjacent seat is the only advantage in terms of comfort one can have in business class on European flights, so -- yay!
On 2.5 hrs plus flights I would prefer a better seat, but in Europe this is not happening yet...
The longest flights operated by Hop are 1h50, most of them are around 1hr.
BT operates flights to Dubai which can be upwards of 5-6 hours, even 8 hours during the conflicts around Iraqi and Iranian airspace. That’s where the fun is when you are stuck in BT’s 2-3 economy “Business” class seats with blocked seats
Wish BA would do the same with its ex LCY business class