Review: Turkmenistan Airlines Business Class Boeing 737 (ASB-DEL)

Four Seasons Yacht via Turkmenistan & Saudi Arabia

More from this series:

• Introduction: Four Seasons Yacht Via Turkmenistan & Saudi Arabia
• Review: Lufthansa Allegris Business Class Boeing 787 (AUS-FRA)
• Review: Lufthansa Welcome Lounge Frankfurt Airport (FRA)
• Review: Priority Lounge Frankfurt Airport Terminal 3 (FRA)
• Review: Turkmenistan Airlines Business Class Boeing 777 (FRA-ASB)
• Review: Business Lounge Ashgabat Airport, Turkmenistan (ASB)
• Review: Turkmenistan Airlines Business Class Boeing 737 (ASB-DEL)

For the next sector of my Four Seasons Yacht via Turkmenistan and Saudi Arabia adventure, I flew Turkmenistan Airlines’ Boeing 737-800 business class on the 3hr5min flight from Ashgabat (ASB) to Delhi (DEL).

In the previous installment, I reviewed Turkmenistan Airlines’ Boeing 777-300ER business class, so it was nice to also see what the short haul product was like. With that in mind, I actually found this flight to be a bit more unusual and memorable — the flight was packed, the inflight meal was massive (and it took forever to serve), and I got (politely) told to stop taking pictures.

All-in-all, this was a pleasant flight, and as usual in this part of the world, the views for most of the flight were incredible, and I couldn’t help but just gaze out the window most of the way.

How I booked my Turkmenistan Airlines business class ticket

Turkmenistan Airlines has no airline partnerships, so there’s no practical way to redeem points on the airline. Fortunately the carrier’s business class fares tend to be really reasonable. Specifically, I booked the following in business class for $1,010, which is hard to beat:

7/15 T5462 Frankfurt to Ashgabat departing 7:00PM arriving 4:00AM (+1 day)
7/16 T5533 Ashgabat to Delhi departing 6:30AM arriving 10:50AM

Turkmenistan Airlines business class lounge & boarding

In previous installments, I covered how Ashgabat Airport is among the strangest airports I’ve transited, and I’ve also reviewed the Business Lounge Ashgabat, which is unique.

My flight to Delhi was departing from gate 104, just a short walk from the lounge. Boarding for the flight was scheduled for 5:45AM, 45 minutes before departure. Boarding ended up starting 10 minutes behind schedule, with business class passengers being invited to board first.

Turkmenistan Airlines 737 business class cabin & seats

At the forward door I was greeted by the lead flight attendant, and turned right into the business class cabin. Turkmenistan Airlines’ 737s are configured with 160 seats, including 16 business class seats and 144 economy class seats.

Business class consists of four rows, in a 2-2 configuration. Think of these seats as being very similar to domestic first class within the United States, except with slightly better pitch.

I was assigned seat 4A, the window seat on the left in the last row.

While Turkmenistan Airlines has Boeing’s latest interiors in terms of updated overhead bins and consoles, the cabin didn’t otherwise feel too modern. There were no seat back screens, and the seats were definitely “last generation” (which is probably a good thing, since so many new seats nowadays lack padding).

The tray table folded out from the far armrest, and needed to be flipped over to be fully used.

There was also a small drink tray underneath the center armrest, which could be folded out.

When it comes to in-seat connectivity, there were two AC power outlets underneath the center armrest, though there was nothing in the way of USB-A or USB-C charging.

Lastly, the plane had individual air nozzles at each seat, though that’s standard on 737s.

All-in-all, it’s a fairly nice cabin. I should also mention that while I made it through the entire previous flight and airport experience without being told not to take pictures (despite the airline and airport reportedly having rules against it), my luck ran out on this flight.

Within minutes of boarding, the lead flight attendant yelled “photos are not allowed” to me, all the way from the galley. Fortunately I had already taken most of my cabin pictures, so I was more strategic about pictures going forward.

Turkmenistan Airlines 737 business class entertainment

Turkmenistan Airlines doesn’t have seat back entertainment on its 737s, and also doesn’t have Wi-Fi. Instead, the primary inflight entertainment comes in the form of streaming entertainment, which you can then play on your own device.

There was a small selection of movies, TV shows, music, games, a map feature, etc. The selection was similar to what was available on the seat back on the 777, so it wasn’t a huge selection. As a result, I’d highly recommend bringing your own entertainment.

The only other form of onboard entertainment is the overhead monitors that are lowered while inflight, which stream the map feature.

Turkmenistan Airlines business class amenities

Waiting at each seat upon boarding was a bottle of water, a small pillow, and a pair of slippers.

Later on in the boarding process, the lead flight attendant came around to offer pre-departure drinks, with the choice of peach juice, Coke, or sparkling water. Talk about an unusual trio of choices! I opted for the peach juice, which was tasty, as you’d expect.

Once airborne, the crew also came around to distribute blankets on request. I thought it was fun how all the blankets had different patterns on them.

All-in-all, that’s a good number of amenities for a fairly short flight!

Turkmenistan Airlines 737 departure from Ashgabat

The boarding process took quite some time, because on this flight, every single seat was taken (unlike my previous flight, which was quite empty). What I found interesting is that most of the passengers seemed to actually be local, based on them communicating with the crew in Turkmen.

For the first 45 minutes of boarding, I was the only passenger in business class. Then just shortly before the door closed, the other 15 business class seats filled up. Given that economy appeared to be oversold, I have to imagine that there were a lot of operational upgrades here.

Anyway, boarding wrapped up around 6:45AM, at which point the main cabin door closed. At 7AM we then began our pushback, with the beautiful 777 that had just flown me from Frankfurt parked next to us. As we pushed back, the safety video was screened.

We started our very short taxi at 7:05AM, and then at 7:10AM we were cleared for takeoff on runway 29R.

That takeoff roll gave a great view of the terminal — as you can see, the main part of the terminal is intended to look like a falcon. This really is quite the airport.

I also loved the views of the nearby maintenance facility, where there were a couple of Turkmenistan Airlines cargo Ilyushin Il-76s — swoon (not a political statement, of course… just an avgeek statement).

I very much enjoyed the views as we continued our climb out, as it was a clear morning. Central Asia just has such amazing landscape.

The seatbelt sign stayed on until around 20 minutes after takeoff. I was watching the map feature with great interest, and around 30 minutes after takeoff I couldn’t help but notice how we were starting a slow turn back toward Ashgabat.

At first I couldn’t help but wonder if we were diverting for some reason, but after a few minutes it became clear we were just in a holding pattern, which we were eventually released from. At that point we continued our journey to Delhi.

Just minutes later there was a medical emergency onboard, as they paged for a doctor. There was one seated in business class, and he headed to the back of the plane. That went on for quite some time, though fortunately that seemed to resolve itself.

Turkmenistan Airlines business class meal service

On this Turkmenistan Airlines business class flight, lunch was served enroute… yes, despite the fact that the flight was scheduled to depart at 6:30AM. This time around they had loaded a couple of menus, so the flight attendant would always present menus to the next two passengers to be served, while serving the current two passengers.

The menu listed both a breakfast and lunch, so my assumption was that breakfast would be served on this flight, but that was quickly corrected by the flight attendant. You can find the menu below.

Service began with warm towels being distributed, with very nice presentation, and a lovely scent.

Then below is the meal I was presented… ummm, wow! As I saw other people being served their meals, it just looked like a massive tray of paper and plastic to me, so I was curious what was going on, but it all made sense when it was served to me.

I removed all of the extra paper and plastic from the tray, which included three bags of snack mix, the cutlery set, butter, mayonnaise, salt, etc.

I must say, Turkmenistan Airlines deserves credit for its plentiful meal service, as this is quite the selection. For the main course, I had the beef stroganoff with rice and vegetables. That was served with a side salad (with feta, cucumbers, and cherry tomatoes), some cold cuts, cheese, cherries, a blueberry yogurt, cake for dessert, a Mars bar, and two bread rolls.

While I wouldn’t say the food was particularly high quality, the airline deserves credit for the effort here, as this is much more substantial than I was expecting.

At the conclusion of the meal, I also ordered a cup of black tea, which was served with lemon.

While beef stroganoff on a 6:30AM flight is a bit unusual, it’s not like my body knew what time it was anyway, so I had no complaints, minus the service flow (which I’ll cover below).

Turkmenistan Airlines 737 business class lavatory

Turkmenistan Airlines has a dedicated business class lavatory on its 737s, located at the front of the cabin, by the cockpit. The lavatory was pretty standard for a 737, and it was clean.

There were a few special amenities, like a cute little flower pot, plus some creams and refreshing wipes.

Turkmenistan Airlines business class service

The lead flight attendant was working the business class cabin on this Turkmenistan Airlines flight. She was rather charming, and did a good job. A couple of things stood out to me.

First of all — and this is minor — it was just impossible to understand any of her announcements. Her English wasn’t great in the first place, and then all the announcements were at such a low volume that she might as well not have said anything.

The bigger issue was the service flow. I felt like there were a lot of flight attendants on this flight (I kept seeing them come up for a variety of reasons), yet only the lead flight attendant worked business class. This just didn’t feel sufficient, given the pace of service.

I ended up being served my meal just 10 minutes before we started our descent, and that was also when I got my first drink. There wasn’t first a round of drinks, but instead, she went straight into the meal service. The issue is how long it took to serve the meal.

She served the cabin front to back, and it felt like it took an incredibly long time to prepare each meal. It was somewhere around 10 minutes between each meal being brought out. When you have 16 meals to serve, that certainly adds up.

It’s not like she was lazy… she was working hard. But something with the flow felt off, because you shouldn’t get your first drink along with your meal just shortly before the descent on a flight that lasts over three hours.

Turkmenistan Airlines 737 arrival in Delhi

At 10:10AM Delhi time the seatbelt sign was turned on, as we started our descent, and the crew prepared the cabin for landing. This included collecting all pillows and blankets. Our approach ended up being pretty drawn out, as we were landing into the northwest, meaning we had to fly past the airport, and then come back around.

At 10:45AM we had a smooth touchdown on runway 29R.

From there we had a 10-minute taxi to our arrival stand, where we pulled in at 10:55AM, five minutes behind schedule. The views on the taxi were great, particularly of the ex-Jet Airways 777s!

From there I had a long layover in Delhi, before flying Air India’s Boeing 777-300ER first class to Frankfurt (FRA).

Bottom line

Turkmenistan Airlines’ 737 business class is pleasant for a fairly short flight, with comfortable seats and extensive meal service.

However, as you’d expect from this strange airline, there are some quirks, including the limited streaming entertainment and lack of Wi-Fi. Also, while the meal served on the flight was large, it took forever to be served, and there was no drink service before that. So while it’s hardly going to sway anyone’s decision of whether or not to fly the airline, it would be nice if things were sped up a bit.

All-in-all, I had a more pleasant Turkmenistan Airlines experience than I was expecting, and given the price, I’d highly recommend it for someone looking for an adventure.

What’s your take on Turkmenistan Airlines’ 737 business class?