American A319s & A320s Get More First Class Seats, But It’s Not All Good News

In March 2024, American Airlines announced plans to retrofit its Airbus A319 & A320 aircraft, to add more first class seats. This announcement coincided with American ordering 260+ Airbus, Boeing, and Embraer jets. There’s now an update, as the first retrofitted plane with new interiors is expected to be in service soon.

American refreshing Airbus jets with more first class seats

American plans to refresh the interiors of its entire Airbus A319 and A320 fleet over the next couple of years. With this project, we’ll see the planes get power ports at every seat, larger overhead bins, and new seats with updated trim and finishes.

Perhaps most exciting of all is that each of these planes will be getting an extra row of first class seats:

• Airbus A319s will go from eight first class seats to 12 first class seats
• Airbus A320s will go from 12 first class seats to 16 first class seats

American claims that this is in response to customers’ increasing demand for premium cabin seats. A 33-50% increase in first class seats on these aircraft is significant. Hopefully it leads to more AAdvantage upgrades, though in reality, a lot of unsold first class seats nowadays are upgraded with cash.

So, what’s the timeline with which this project is taking place? American plans to start with the A319s, and then reconfigure the A320s. Among the A319s, the legacy American ones will be reconfigured first, followed by the legacy US Airways ones (meanwhile all the A320s are legacy US Airways).

JonNYC now reports that the first of these planes should be in service very soon. This is the 12-year-old jet with the registration code N9002U. This plane has been in San Salvador (SAL) since September 2025, so presumably that’s where this project will take place.

In the interest of being thorough, let me clarify that American doesn’t have plans to increase first class capacity on its Boeing 737s (800s and MAX 8s) or Airbus A321s (ceos and neos) beyond the current 16 and 20 seats, respectively.

For context on how these planes fit into American’s fleet, the airline currently has 132 A319s and 48 A320s. Most of these were inherited by American during the merger with US Airways. The A319s are an average of over 21 years old, while the A320s are an average of over 24 years old. While they’re used throughout North America, you’ll find these jets the most in the Northeast.

Sadly enough, the 32 legacy American A319s are first to be reconfigured, and those are also American’s only “standard” narrow body jets with seat back TVs. So expect for those screens to be ripped out.

Expect Airbus A319 & A320 economy cabins to get tighter

On balance, updates to these aircraft are probably good news, in terms of more first class seats, consistent power ports, and larger overhead bins. For the past several years, American’s focus has been on having a consistent Airbus A321 and Boeing 737 fleet, and now we’re seeing the airline focus on its A319s and A320s.

The thing to keep in mind is that as American reconfigures these aircraft, we’re not only seeing more first class seats installed, but we’re also seeing overall capacity increase, meaning that seating will get tighter.

For example, Airbus A319s currently have 128 seats, comprised of eight first class seats and 120 economy seats. Once reconfigured, capacity will increase to 132 seats, identical to what you’ll find on Delta, where there are 12 first class seats and 120 economy seats.

I imagine it’ll be the same story on A320s, with American following Delta’s lead. American’s A320s have 150 seats, comprised of 12 first class seats and 138 economy seats. Capacity will probably increase to 157 seats, including 16 first class seats and 141 economy seats. Or maybe they’ll keep it just under 150, so they can avoid adding an extra flight attendant (since one is required for every 50 seats).

So, how is American able to increase capacity, while also increasing the number of first class seats? In addition to a slight reduction in pitch, we’ll also see major changes to the rear galley. The actual amount of galley space will be decreased considerably, so that the lavatories can go in the very back of the plane, in a space that used to just have galley space. That’s not going to be great for crews, since it also means that a jump seat will be on the back of a lavatory door.

For a sense of what to expect, compare American’s old A319 seat map to Delta’s A319 seat map, and in particular, look in the rear galley space.

No wonder Delta does better with revenue — the airline is great at cramming seats into (largely very old) planes, but mood lighting and seat back entertainment make people forget about that.

Bottom line

American is starting the process of retrofitting its Airbus A319 and A320 fleet. The biggest “headline” announcement is that American is adding a row of first class seats, meaning the planes will have 12 and 16 first class seats, respectively.

On top of that, these planes will get full cabin overhauls, including larger overhead bins, power at every seat, and a tighter cabin. It’s not just that pitch will be reduced, but the rear galley will become much tighter, so that lavatories can be squeezed into the very back of the plane.

With this, American will be able to increase the overall capacity of the cabin while also adding a row of first class seats. These changes are a mixed bag. First class passengers or those looking to upgrade will be happy, while economy passengers and crews will likely be less happy.

I am sad that American will be ripping out TVs from the 32 A319s that have them installed. For American’s domestic fleet, they’re basically the last reminder of American’s previous brief attempt to become more premium, around a decade ago.

What do you make of American’s Airbus cabin changes?