Why Seat Size Should Be Considered When Booking a Flight
JetBlue this week unveiled a novelty designed for the economy class cabin of its A320 that it claims will “take humanity back on a journey by air,” thanks in large part to larger, more comfortable seats.
The aircraft seats are 18 “wide (the old was 17.8”) making them the largest available on the A320. JetBlue also claims that the new design offers “the most legroom on any American airline bus,” and there are other bells and whistles such as free high-speed Wi-Fi, power points at every seat, and enhanced in-flight entertainment.
The first of the refurbished aircraft took off on Wednesday. But for now, if you’re flying JetBlue, you’re not guaranteed to get on board. According to DigitalTrends, the process of transforming the entire A320 fleet into a “living room in the sky” will take three years.
The launch sparked a conversation here at Lifehacker headquarters about how people typically search for flights by price, but often don’t take into account where they’re going to sit.
For a short trip, that extra few inches of legroom or seating may not make much of a difference, but if you are traveling for more than a few hours, then not pinning down next to your neighbor can mean the difference between a happy arrival and ready to pounce on the next person who is even close. will come close to your armrest, even if you are a “tiny” person.
The Points Guy recently broke a new 777-200 United setting and even suggests that in some cases you might miss Economy Plus for a few select Economy seats, which are marginally better.
For those new to the game with seats, the gold standard for determining your plane’s volume is SeatGuru . The site (and its app) offers details on the various planes and how much space you have on board, depending on who you choose to fly with. I check it before choosing a seat on almost every flight I use.
In addition to sizing information, it can also tell you if you have an outlet in your seat (I assure you, this is what you need, even if you do not understand it), what kind of in-flight entertainment will be available, regardless of whether Do planes have Wi-Fi (yes, some do not).
You can get general information on what to expect from short-haul economy flights here and long-haul economy flights here .
Apart from that, SeatGuru will also alert you to where the lousy seats are on the plane. For example, in the current JetBlue setup for the A320, 12 and 13 A and F seats may look like great window seats, but the window is offset, so if you want to capture slow motion footage of your landing, you’d better choose one row back. Row 10 costs the same as all the other “even more room” seats but offers limited recline, and you pay more to sit in row 9 than 12, but you won’t be able to recline at all.
The things he points out are sometimes transgressors / bargainers and sometimes not, but it’s helpful to be aware and make an informed decision about your place, rather than randomly picking a useless item when something better was still available for the same price.
Bottom line: If you don’t shop at the last minute and have a lot of options, make sure you pick the most convenient travel destination. You will thank yourself later.