JetBlue Cabin Redesign Promises Both More Seats and Greater Comfort
Jeff Edwards October 02, 2017
JetBlue’s plans for restyled A320 cabins will have plenty of perks for passengers as well as creating some good news for the bottom line by increasing capacity by a dozen seats.
JetBlue wants air travelers to be excited about plans for refurbished cabins on the the New York-based airline’s fleet of Airbus A320 aircraft. In truth, there are plenty of reasons for the flying public to look forward to the restyled planes, but investors might end up being the ones with something to really celebrate.
Designs call for increasing the number of seats on some aircraft from 150 seats to more than 160 seats. To make more room for those additional passengers, there will undoubtably be some sacrifices when it comes to legroom, but JetBlue hopes flyers will notice the additional amenities rather than the shrinking seat pitch.
The airline says that the redesigned ergonomic seats with adjustable headrests will still be the widest seats available. Even after squeezing in a dozen extra seats, JetBlue maintains that it will still be able to lay claim to bragging rights of having “the most legroom in coach” of any US carrier. The new seats will also have gate-to-gate “Fly-fi,” with built-in power with USB ports.
The airline might also be counting on new in-flight entertainment options to take the sting out of the slightly reduced legroom. Each seat in the redesigned cabins will have 10-inch touchscreen monitors with more than 100 Direct TV channels, on demand movies and the option of syncing personal electronic devices to the seat-back monitors.
According to the airline, the new cabins will also feature the latest “easy on the eyes” mood lighting. The LED lighting design will allow the choice of a shifting pallet of colors and light settings that might just help to make passengers much too relaxed to argue with seat mates about reclining a bit too quickly or hogging the overhead bins.
[Photo: Shutterstock]
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Why is there a picture of an Embraer on this article?
Seat pitch (legroom) is what matters. Period! As for the "amenities", there is almost never anything on there (movies, TV shows) in which I am interested that I want to see, anyway. At most I use the headphones for the music but even there the selection of what I like has become quite limited. Even if there was a better selection, seat pitch still trumps it.
Yes, what everyone else said.
Leg room is literally the only reason I even consider Jet Blue. As for the other amenities, I think my wife is at about 50% broken rate for seat back screens on our recent flights. We'd rather just use our own iPads.
Agree with rylan. Not much point in a big screen if it's right in your face on the seat in front. But Jet Blue is right about the seat width, the A320 cabin is about 1/2 foot wider than the 737 so there is noticeably more room sideways.