Review: Oman Air Business Class Boeing 787 (MXP-MCT)

To complete the outbound portion of my downgraded adventure to Oman, I flew Oman Air’s Boeing 787-9 business class on the sub-six-hour redeye flight from Milan to Muscat.

This flight was sublime and the perfect example of how on a good day, Oman Air has one of the world’s best business-class products. Oman Air has among my favorite business class seats, unbeatable amenities, delicious food, and friendly service. On some days, the airline even beats top competitors in the region.

The catch is that Oman Air isn’t consistent because after this flight, I turned around and flew business class to Frankfurt, and my experience could hardly have been more different…

How I booked my Oman Air business class ticket

I booked my Oman Air business class ticket using Air Canada Aeroplan points as part of a larger itinerary. Specifically, I booked the following award in business class for 110,000 Air Canada Aeroplan points plus $154.44 in taxes and fees:

1/11 AC1207 Miami to Montreal departing 8:00AM arriving 11:36AM
1/11 LX87 Montreal to Zurich departing 4:50PM arriving 6:15AM (+1 day)
1/12 LX1622 Zurich to Milan departing 5:40PM arriving 6:40PM
1/12 WY144 Milan to Muscat departing 9:30PM arriving 6:45AM (+1 day)

Aeroplan points are easy to come by, as the program is transfer partners with Amex Membership Rewards, Capital One, and Chase Ultimate Rewards. On top of that, there’s the Aeroplan® Credit Card (review) in the United States, which is quite rewarding.

Oman Air business class lounge & boarding

I had just under three hours at Milan Malpensa Airport, as I had arrived from Zurich in Helvetic Airways’ Embraer E190-E2 business class. My Oman Air flight to Muscat was scheduled to depart from gate B55, with boarding planned for 8:30PM, an hour ahead of departure.

Oman Air sends its passengers to the Sala Montale Lounge, which I recently reviewed. I walked into the lounge and then walked right back out again, as it was packed.

I quickly figured out why the lounge was so busy — Qatar Airways, Etihad, Oman Air, and Emirates, all have flights departing within one hour of one another in the evenings. Not only that, but they literally departed from gates next to one another, so the gate area at that end of the terminal was quite busy as well.

Boarding ended up starting at 8:40PM, with business class passengers being invited to board first. I was excited to be back on Oman Air!

Oman Air 787 business class cabin & seats

I boarded through the second set of doors, where I was greeted by the cabin manager and one of the lovely business class flight attendants, and pointed toward my seat. Oman Air has Apex Suites in business class on its Boeing 787s, which I rank as one of the best business class seats.

This version of Oman Air’s 787-9 has a total of 30 business class seats, spread across five rows, in a 2-2-2 configuration. The forward cabin has four rows, while there’s also a rear cabin with one row. I booked myself in the one row mini cabin, but first had a quick look at the forward cabin.

You’ve gotta love how spacious the cabin feels, thanks to the lack of overhead bins in the center of the cabin, which contribute to an open feel. While I love Apex Suites, this product is such an inefficient use of space. Other airlines can fit 32 business class seats into the space between doors one and two on the 787-9, while Oman Air has only 24 seats.

At first glance, Apex Suites might look like totally unremarkable seats, so those not familiar with them might wonder what makes them special. What makes all Apex Suites seats great is that there are no small footwells you have to cram your feet into, but rather everyone gets a big ottoman. Furthermore, each seat pair has a proper privacy divider.

That being said, it’s not the middle pair of seats that makes me love this configuration, even though those seats are good as well.

It’s the window seats that make Apex Suites the most special. I assigned myself seat 15A, the window seat on the left side in the last row (in the mini cabin).

As you can see below, the seats by the windows are all staggered, and that’s so that the person in the window seat gets direct aisle access. The window seat has a small pathway providing direct aisle access, so there’s no need to jump over the person in the aisle.

If you look at the seat head-on, it might not look too exciting…

…but it’s a totally different story when you view the seat in the other direction. You have endless legroom, in a way that no other business class seat in the world provides.

It’s not just that you have unlimited legroom and don’t have a small footwell you have to shove your feet into, but you also have more privacy than you’ll find in any business class seat with a door. That’s because there’s a privacy partition that goes up between seats, and it doesn’t even need to stay down for takeoff or landing.

Every seat has its downsides, and Apex Suites are no exception. One downside to this product is that it can feel a bit narrow, though not problematically so. Another downside is the lack of storage near where you’re sitting. There is a lot of room to store stuff underneath the ottoman, though you have to stand up to reach that.

On top of that, there’s an exposed storage compartment to the bottom side of the seat, though it’s not easy to reach that space if the tray table is out, and the shape of the storage is also awkward. For example, you couldn’t store a laptop there.

Speaking of the tray table, that extends out from the side armrest. The tray table is large, though don’t expect that you’ll be able to sneak out once it’s extended, so time your lavatory use accordingly.

As far as other seat features go, the entertainment controller is at the seat’s center console, and that’s also where buttons are located to control the privacy partition.

Underneath the entertainment controller you’ll find the headphone jack, two USB-A outlets, and an AC power outlet. Maybe I’m just getting old, but actually trying to get anything into the AC power outlet requires quite some contortion, given where it’s located.

The primary seat controls are located on the other armrest, and are self explanatory. However, it can also be easy to accidentally hit these buttons when you don’t mean to, given where they’re located.

Oman Air sadly doesn’t have individual air nozzles on its 787s, but then again, most non-US carriers don’t.

Apex Suites are such a lovely yet inefficient product, and these window seats are among my favorite out there. What made this even better was that in the mini cabin, there was no one next to me, and also no one in the center seats. It felt like I had the jet to myself, as I couldn’t see anyone else.

Oman Air business class amenities

While Oman Air’s hard product is commendable, the soft product is even better, with an astounding number of amenities offered on this short redeye flight.

For one, waiting at each seat upon boarding was a pillow, blanket, and mattress pad. I love Oman Air’s bedding, in particular the blanket. And because all the seats around me were empty, I was able to build quite the pillow and blanket fort later in the flight, as I love a soft sleeping surface.

Moments after settling in, the crew offered pre-departure drinks, with the choice of orange or grapefruit juice. I selected the latter, and was offered a warm or cold towel to go along with it. I appreciate how Oman Air offers the choice, as all the small details add up to a big difference.

Later in the boarding process, Arabic coffee and dates were offered. That’s something you won’t be offered on other Gulf carriers in business class on comparable flights (for example, Emirates and Qatar Airways generally offer this in first class and not business class, with the limited exceptions).

I was then presented with the amenity kit, created in partnership with Omani perfumery Amouage. The kit included socks, eyeshades, earplugs, mouthwash, hand sanitizer, lip balm, facial moisturizer, and a small tube of the company’s Meander fragrance. Other basic amenities (like dental kits) are available in the lavatory.

If you’re into this kind of stuff, Amouage has some of my favorite fragrances of any brands, and the brand has a duty free shop at Muscat Airport. All their scents are unique and concentrated, though also very expensive. I picked up a bottle of cologne as a gift for Ford, and it’s currently his favorite.

In addition to the amenity kit, Oman Air is also among the relatively few airlines to offer pajamas in business class. I love Oman Air’s pajamas, as they’re comfortable and have the carrier’s branding.

The airline also offers business class passengers well padded slippers, which are probably the heaviest slippers I’ve received on any airline.

Next, I was given the menu for the flight.

Lastly, headphones were distributed. The headphones are light and feel cheap, but I found the sound quality to be surprisingly good.

Oman Air’s business class amenities are unbelievable, with pajamas, amenity kits, and great bedding, on overnight flights.

Oman Air 787 business class entertainment & Wi-Fi

Oman Air’s Boeing 787 business class boasts a modern entertainment system, named ARIA. The monitor isn’t touchscreen (which makes sense, given how far it is from the seat), but rather you can select options with the entertainment controller. While I wouldn’t say it’s among the best in the world, the entertainment selection was extensive, with a huge selection of movies, TV shows, music, games, and radio.

The airline only introduced this system in the last few years, so this represents a significant improvement over the old selection.

I ended up watching a couple of episodes of “American Auto,” which I hadn’t seen before, but found to be entertaining and easy to watch.

Of course Oman Air also has a map feature, which I kept an eye on during much of the flight.

Now, on to the weak part of the Oman Air experience. Oman Air uses OnAir for its inflight Wi-Fi, which is known for being among the slowest offerings out there. I could get over that, except Oman Air’s pricing for Wi-Fi is data based, and is outrageous:

• A one hour pass with a 10 MB allowance costs $11.90
• A three hour pass with a 40 MB allowance costs $24.90
• A full flight pass with a 150 MB allowance costs $39.90

First of all, the pricing model makes no sense. A one hour pass with a 10 MB allowance? That’s… no, that’s not how that works. And then there’s the pricing, with pricing ranging from $0.27 to $1.19 per MB of data. What do I look like, the Sultan?!

C’mon, Oman Air, not only is this a disservice to your passengers in terms of offering a valuable amenity, but I don’t think the airline is maximizing revenue with this pricing either.

Oman Air 787 departure from Milan

Boarding was quite efficient, despite the busy flight, as every single economy seat was occupied, while there were eight empty seats in business class (including the three seats across from me — that’s one of the reasons I usually sit in the back of the cabin).

Throughout the boarding process, I enjoyed listening to Oman Air’s boarding music, which is among my favorite airline boarding music. Unfortunately about 15 minutes before departure, there was a bit of excitement in the cabin, as two business class passengers seemingly got into a physical altercation.

The police had to be called, and the passengers were offloaded, and I wrote more about this in a separate post.

The fight ended up causing a departure delay. 20 minutes past our scheduled 9:30PM departure, the captain was on the PA to apologize for the delay, and he explained it was due to the need to offload two passengers. He advised of the flight time of 5hr30min and the cruising altitude of 37,000 feet.

For those who are interested in this kind of stuff, Oman Air mostly has Omani pilots, unlike the “big three” Gulf carriers, where a vast majority of pilots are ex-pats. That also reflects that locals in Oman tend to be part of the overall workforce in a more consistent way.

Finally at 10:15PM, the main cabin door closed. Then at 10:20PM, we began our pushback, at which point the safety video was screened. At 10:25PM, we started our taxi, and just five minutes later we were barreling down runway 35L for our takeoff.

We had a smooth climb into the night, and the seatbelt sign was turned off about five minutes after takeoff.

Oman Air business class dinner service

Oman Air has a dine on demand concept in business class, and on this flight there was a dinner option, as well as a refreshment option, and you can find the menu below.

Below is the Oman Air beverage list. Unfortunately the airline doesn’t publish a wine list, but the crew usually have some knowledge into the specifics of what’s being offered based on your preferences.

After takeoff, the crew came around to take orders. I kicked off my flight with a glass of champagne, plus some mixed (room temperature) nuts. Oman Air is currently pouring Piper-Heidsieck Cuvee Brut in business class, which I enjoyed.

This was served around 30 minutes after takeoff, which isn’t bad, given that I was seated in the last row. I like how Oman Air goes about serving drinks — they bring out the glass, then present you with the bottle, and then pour into the glass in front of you.

Then around 45 minutes after takeoff, the meal service began. Oman Air offers a restaurant-style dining experience, with a huge tablecloth, a bread basket, olive oil, butter, salt and pepper shakers, etc. For my starter, I ordered the roasted pumpkin and yellow lentil soup with lentil puy, fennel, onion sprout, and shaved sourdough and crostini.

The soup bowl was brought to me with a lid on, and that was removed once it was placed on my table. Talk about elegant presentation!

For the main course, I ordered the Omani dish, which was the prawn machboos with rice, topped with mixed nuts, fried onions, grilled peppers, zucchini, eggplant, and carrots. This was one of the best mains I’ve ever had in business class, and the presentation was even in line with what you’d expect in a restaurant. Just lovely.

While I was getting full, I figured I had to review more of the service, so I ordered a cheese plate, which came with three kinds of cheese, grapes, and some dried fruit.

Lastly, I finished the meal with dessert, which was a raspberry and white chocolate frangipane, with lime anglaise and berries compote, pistachio, and chocolate cookie crumble.

What can I say, Oman Air has a spectacularly good meal service. This would be an incredible meal on any long haul flight, let alone on a short overnight redeye.

Oman Air 787 business class lavatories

Oman Air’s Boeing 787-9s have three business class lavatories — there are two at the very front of the cabin by the first set of doors (on the left and the right), and then one by the second set of doors (on the right). These are typical 787 Dreamliner lavatories, with a couple of unique features.

For one, the lavatories have bidets, which you don’t find on many airlines.

The business class lavatories also have some extra amenities, including some Amouage toiletries, dental kits, and shaving kits.

Oman Air 787 business class bed

Oman Air provides turndown service in business class, so after I finished my meal, I asked to have my bed made, which the crew quickly took care of. Business class beds don’t get much lovelier than this, eh? I find this to be such a comfortable seat to sleep in, thanks to there being no footwell, but rather the ottoman becomes part of the bed.

Unfortunately I didn’t have much time to sleep, as I got in bed with around 3hr40min remaining to Muscat…

…and I was woken up around 1hr20min before landing for the refreshment service, since I wanted to review that as well (not that I wanted or needed any more food just a couple of hours after my previous meal!).

While I didn’t sleep for long, the sleep quality was excellent. One thing that surprised me is that the cabin was kept ice cold. I was worried based on the lack of individual air nozzles that I’d get too warm, but I ended up using multiple blankets just to not be uncomfortably cold.

Oman Air business class breakfast

Before going to sleep, I had already placed my order with the crew, so that was automatically brought out after I was woken up. The refreshment service consisted of a delicious fruit plate, a variety of pastries and sweets, and a cappuccino.

I just had a few pieces of fruit, though I did order a black coffee before landing, which the crew promptly brought out. It’s cute how Oman Air always serves coffee and tea on a tray, accompanied by a sweet treat.

I was also offered another warm towel before landing.

Oman Air business class service

Oman Air takes a different approach than other Gulf carriers when it comes to flight attendant staffing. Like Gulf Air and Saudia (and unlike Emirates, Etihad, and Qatar), flight attendants are primarily a mix of local males and and foreign females. However, unlike on Saudia, the locals aren’t necessarily always in charge, and they often report to the foreign female cabin managers.

The issue with Oman Air is that service is very inconsistent, and the airline has some phenomenal crews, and some less impressive crews. The crew on this flight fit in the former category.

The cabin manager was from the Philippines, and she was professional, detail oriented, and engaging. She personally welcomed each business class passenger, and said bye as well later in the flight. She really set the tone for the service. Most of the inflight service in my section was provided by a woman from India, who was top notch as well. There were two men from Oman working the flight, and they were kind and seemed to be quite hard working as well.

Oman Air 787 arrival in Muscat

At 6:30AM Muscat time, the captain announced that we’d be descending soon, and would be landing at 7:05AM (we were scheduled to arrive at 6:45AM). The sunrise over the United Arab Emirates as we descended was gorgeous.

One thing I don’t love about Oman Air is how long before arrival the crew prepares the cabin for landing. As soon as the captain announced we’d be descending, the crew turned the lights up all the way, opened the curtains between cabins, asked passengers to put their seat upright, etc. That seems to be a consistent policy at the airline, so it wasn’t just this crew.

The approach ended up taking a bit longer than usual, but I was in no rush!

We finally touched down in Muscat at 7:10AM on runway 26R.

From there we had a short five minute taxi to our arrival gate.

Bottom line

When Oman Air is good in business class, the airline is really, really good, and can compete with any airline. From comfortable seats, to endless amenities, to delicious food, to friendly service, to solid entertainment, there was a lot to love about this flight. The only thing I can really criticize is the Wi-Fi situation, both in terms of quality and pricing. Suffice it to say that I walked away from this Oman Air flight with a favorable impression.

What’s your take on Oman Air 787 business class?