New United Airlines Employee Uniforms Launching, After Major Delay

United Airlines is expected to start rolling out its new employee uniforms in the coming weeks, nearly a decade after this project started (thanks to PYOK for flagging this).

New United uniforms launch on May 28, 2025

United flight attendants are being instructed to start wearing their new uniforms as of May 28, 2025. I’d imagine that other employee groups will be switching to new uniforms around the same time, but that remains to be seen. While there’s of course the chance that the timeline gets pushed back, that’s the current plan. These uniforms have been designed in partnership with Tracy Reese, Brooks Brothers, and Carhartt.

Interestingly, United’s safety video released in May 2024 already featured employees in the new uniforms. That gives you a sense of how much this project has been delayed even in recent times, as it’ll be roughly a year from then before employees are actually wearing these uniforms.

It’s always fun to see airlines introducing new uniforms. As customers, employee uniforms shouldn’t matter much to us, at least not directly. The way I see it, what’s important in airline uniforms is that:

• They make employees take pride in their appearance; it’s nice to look presentable, so if uniform design can help with that, it’s for the better
• They allow employees to be comfortable; uniforms can’t just be about style, but also need to be about comfort, especially given the conditions in which airline employees often work
• They need to be safe to wear, as this has been an issue some airlines have had, where people have allergic reactions (or worse) to uniforms

Why United’s uniform refresh has been so delayed

United has been working on its new uniform project since 2017. For that matter, the airline actually unveiled its new uniforms in January 2019, well over six years ago. So why has it taken so many years for the uniform to actually launch? Well, there are several factors at play.

For one, it’s normal for airlines to first test uniforms for an extended period of time for comfort, to make sure that they’re comfortable, durable, and don’t cause any allergic reactions. In United’s case, the airline tested these on over 1,300 pilots, flight attendants, and customer service agents, with a focus on getting feedback on the fit and function of each garment.

I guess United is happy it did that testing, because apparently the employee feedback on the uniforms was quite negative, including in terms of the aesthetics, and several changes were ultimately made.

Let’s take a look at some of the pictures that United shared of the new uniforms back in 2019. At the time, the airline emphasized that it would continue to refine designs. So the uniforms you see in the above safety video are more indicative of what to expect than the ones below (which have been modified since).

Below were the proposed new pilot uniforms…

…and the proposed new flight attendant uniforms…

…and the proposed new customer service agent uniforms…

…and the proposed new tech operations uniforms…

…and the proposed new ramp service uniforms…

…and the proposed catering operations uniforms.

I imagine in the coming weeks, United will share updated images of the final uniforms that were ultimately decided on.

Bottom line

After extensive delays, United’s new uniforms are finally expected to roll out in the coming weeks, as of late May. These uniforms were first unveiled back in 2019, but due to feedback, have been modified considerably. Over six years later, they’ll finally be worn on a widespread basis.

What do you make of United’s new uniform rollout?