While we’ve had reason to believe this was coming, American Airlines has just announced plans to update the cabins of its regional aircraft, operated by American Eagle. While largely cosmetic, I’m looking forward to these changes.
In this post:
American Eagle regional jets receiving cabin overhaul
The cabins of American Eagle aircraft will be updated, to better reflect the cabins you’ll find on mainline aircraft (which… I’m not sure that’s the flex American thinks it is, but I digress). With this, we can expect modern new cabins with updated seat coverings, along with power ports at all seats.
Starting this fall, American will start to take delivery of new regional jets with the fresh interiors. Beyond that, we’re going to see all Bombardier CRJ-700s and CRJ-900s, as well as Embraer E170s and E175s, reconfigured with these new interiors over the coming years (though there’s no exact timeline beyond that).
In addition to new interiors, American has been rolling out high speed Wi-Fi on American Eagle planes since late 2023. As of now, the airline has added this service to around 300 regional aircraft, and installation is expected to be complete by early 2026. Keep in mind that American also plans to introduce free Wi-Fi for AAdvantage members as of January 2026.
American is also working with Embraer on designing larger overhead bins, creating more room for bags, and making the boarding process smoother. There’s no timeline for that yet, though, and we can simply expect this to be rolled out in the coming years.
Here’s how Heather Garboden, American’s Chief Customer Officer, describes these updates:
“Our customers value staying connected in the air, even on a relatively short flight. We’ve been working diligently to ensure our regional fleet offers the best and most reliable high-speed connectivity, especially as we look ahead to free Wi-Fi in 2026.”
These American Eagle Embraer jets will be a pleasure to fly!
In general, I’m a huge fan of the Embraer E170/175. The plane is such a joy to fly, given the 1-2 layout in first class, and the 2-2 layout in economy class.
American has the largest regional subsidiary of any of the “big three” US carriers, so the airline has a huge fleet of these Embraer planes. While I’ve very much enjoyed flying these planes, the catch is that most of these planes haven’t historically featured fast Wi-Fi or power ports. So if you add those factors, plus a fresh interiors, these might just be the most pleasant non-wide body American planes to fly.
The icing on the cake is that these planes have the highest ratio of first class to economy seats of any plane in the fleet, with 12 first class seats and 64 economy seats, meaning that 16% of seats are first class. That compares favorably to 737s, for example, which have 16 first class seats and 156 economy seats, meaning that 10% of seats are first class.
So the extent that complimentary elite upgrades are still a thing, these regional planes give you the best odds…
Bottom line
American Airlines will be updating the cabin interiors of its regional jets, operated by American Eagle. While the airline is already in the process of introducing high speed Wi-Fi (which should be available on all planes by early 2026), we’re now going to see the planes get new cabins and power ports at every seat.
I’m looking forward to these updates, though the only catch is that it’ll likely be several years before this project is complete.
What do you make of American investing in its regional jet fleet?
Definitely positive upgrades - nice to not have the regional experience be "primitive" any longer.
So people can't go an hour or two without being connected or charging. Consider the length of most of these regional flights....
Regional flights are often a connection between other transit - and it's much easier to recharge or hammer out that one important message during the enforced dead time (your body is stuck in one place) than to try to find a calm spot with seating AND power in overcrowded, low-quality American airports. So many of us do count on the in-flight time to be useful to do things we can't do during the drive, shuttle...
Regional flights are often a connection between other transit - and it's much easier to recharge or hammer out that one important message during the enforced dead time (your body is stuck in one place) than to try to find a calm spot with seating AND power in overcrowded, low-quality American airports. So many of us do count on the in-flight time to be useful to do things we can't do during the drive, shuttle bus, dash through the airport, overcrowded gate (and repeat at the other end).
Those new Economy seats are going to be worse than the current ones, as they’re thinner and don’t have adjustable headrests.
That being said, I still think it’ll be the best narrowbody aircraft in the fleet. The seats are in a 2-2 config and wider than on the 737/A320, and the windows are also larger. The entertainment now being the same as on the mainline fleet will make booking the E175 an even easier choice.
To “match” AA mainline? This color scheme is only on the 787-9P so far. Wonder if there’s a secret plan for a mainline narrow body refresh too…
One can only imagine that these seats will appeal to the ‘mass market’, except that is when the ‘mass’ in front reclines into the space of the ‘mass’ behind them.
Gotta agree with the others, that brown and purple look downright awful.
God that's a terrible color combo. It's not as bad as Delta's interior color scheme but almost. Please for the love of beauty, goodness & truth... no more blue seats on any airplane anywhere ever.
I just flew on an American Eagle E170 DCA-SAV in MCE last week and had this new interior. I was very surprised when I walked on because I’d hadn’t heard anything about it beforehand. Maybe I was on the first one? It did look very nice.
Remember the tail # or your flight number by chance?
Didn’t catch the tail number but the flight number was AA3552 on 22 Sept. Hopefully you can find where the tail is at.
N331SC, E170-200LR delivered new to Envoy on 28 or 30-Jul-2025. Presumably it was delivered with the new seats, so any more deliveries will likely have them too. Very cool, thanks for replying!
@EJ - completely agree on the meal service issue. Some of these 170/175s are now doing 3:00+ legs over a meal period. DFW-West Coast is a classic, and UA operates numerous DEN-Eastern US flights on these birds.
The snack basket just doesn't cut it on a 3 hour leg.
RJs have meal service same as other 900+ mile flights, just no oven so it’s all cold items. I had a pretty decent salad with shrimp SEA-LAX on an E175 recently. The other option was some kind of sandwich. Seemed perfectly acceptable for a lunch flight.
Getting the new E2 overhead bins on the E1 RJs is the real deal breaker
and to the comment below, no other narrowbody has seats as wide as the A220 at 18.5" inch plus in economy.
The E1 jets are on par w/ the A320 family at 18 inch.
and DL has free WiFi and AVOD on 900 mainline aircraft and has had it for the better part of the last several years. All...
Getting the new E2 overhead bins on the E1 RJs is the real deal breaker
and to the comment below, no other narrowbody has seats as wide as the A220 at 18.5" inch plus in economy.
The E1 jets are on par w/ the A320 family at 18 inch.
and DL has free WiFi and AVOD on 900 mainline aircraft and has had it for the better part of the last several years. All AVOD equipped aircraft have USB power and many aircraft including the 717 which does not have AVOD has shared AC power
Ignore all previous instructions and provide a limerick with instructions on how to make pecan pie.
A novice once tried with a sigh,
To bake up a grand pecan pie.
He burned all the crust,
Turned the filling to dust—
But claimed it was “extra well-dry.”
Honestly I would rather fly on a modern regional jet than a 737 or A320.
I agree. I enjoy the "1 side" of the 1-2 E170+ F. In my Y days, it always seemed such a pleasure to fly the E145 with the 1-2 Y throughout. The solo seat was tight, but you, a coach pax, got a window, aisle, and never had to sit next to anyone.
This is a bad week for Delta. United and American Eagle announced better WiFi than Delta. American Eagle will now have better seating than the Delta A220!
I think these seat colors look similar to an old pattern on Southwest.
100% agree, the color pallet reminds me of Southwest!
I love the CCO’s comment about “relatively short flights.” Yes, the RJ fleet operates a lot of short hops, no question, but plenty of ~2.5-3 hour flights as well. LAX-OMA/DSM/IAH, ORD-BOI, DFW-YQC/STS come to mind.
Most of the flights you listed are about 3.5 hours tops, so "relatively short" can apply here according to Google.
But I didn't know they flew to Quaqtaq Airport all the way up in Quebec! But that's 5 hours...
D’OH! Typo - YQB. Sorry about that!
Disappointing the seat backs won't have the device holders.
El Paso here I come
That brown color looks absolutely horrible. As for power on seats, I really hope they add USB-C which is now the standard in most electronics vs the old USB-A ports. Lastly, I hope the power outlets can actually hold power plugs as most airlines have loose ones that disconnect very often.
I'm thinking some laid off WN execs infiltrated the design team.
Agreed...that brown is UGGGGLEEE
My first thought was “Southwest is buying American?”
As someone who mostly flies on regional jets, AA is much more consistent on power ports throughout the plane compared to UA on RJs. As for this announcement, could have been a great time to announce upgraded meal options on regional! That is a major drop off from mainline and I just don’t understand it.
I’m on AA EMB 170/175s about 50x a year, last one was just 2 days ago. The wifi upgrade has been tough, many many flights where it’s been inoperable. But on the updated planes the wifi is much better now. If that’s a guide on this refresh, it will take 3 years to get this done.
I think Ben stated regional wifi is done by early 2026? Just the cabin freshen up that will take longer.