Flew the latest Thai Airways First last month and just posted a review of the flight over on Altimtr. For the whole text and all photos you can head to that review at this link if you wish, or please find part of the review below. Will be curious to hear if others on here have had similar experiences or not. Thanks for reading!

Flight taken: TG921 Frankfurt (FRA) - Bangkok (BKK)

Product: Thai Airways new First Class



Thai’s newest First Class has the makings of a truly great product even if it’s not fully there yet. The suites aren’t completely private, the food is nothing special, and the flight attendants, though friendly, aren’t the most practiced and confident in the sky by any means. We don’t love the yellow blankets and purple carpets in combination. The inflight internet is comically overpriced. Nevertheless, the cabin and the seat feel great and we loved our ten-hour flight to Bangkok despite the smaller failings of the product.

It’s a major improvement over the old mostly-purple Thai First, with lots of soothing beige and cream tones. The cabin is nicely lit – a warm, rosy light prevails, something many airlines don’t get right. And the A380’s flying characteristics – an oddly comforting behemoth (maybe it’s the low hum of the engines, or the big wing smoothing out the turbulence?) – certainly help.

Thai Airways could do a lot to improve in First, but the seat itself is exceedingly comfortable and lovely to look at. That’s a great starting point and we think the most important part to get right. There’s nothing terribly wrong with the service side – it just needs some inspired rethinking and refinement. Here’s hoping Thai continues to get better and better.



Seat & cabin

The cabin, as mentioned, is lovely. Thai has gone easy on the signature purple here, opting for a more understated color scheme. Still, it’s not generic – and Thai’s colors are present.

There are 12 First seats in a 1-2-1 configuration, right at the front of the upper deck (which is nice as it’s not as cavernous as the lower deck, where some carriers put their First cabin.) There’s an enormous bathroom at the front on the left side, and a mostly-not-very-useful sitting area over on the right side. Between those is a self-serve area oddly stocked with Lays potato chips and other not-so-appealing items, but you won’t feel the need to spend much time there nor will you need to go there for food, so it doesn’t really matter.

The seat is very soft and comfortable, with plenty of counter space as well as a number of storage bins along the sidewall (just don’t forget to take things out of there before deplaning – seems they could easily disappear). There’s a large screen with good resolution and there’s an ottoman-style seat where you could have a companion sit across from you if desired.



Two things are odd about the seat: first, the little panel above the armrest that emits a purple light when turned on, serving no real purpose. Second, the table is permanently out – it’s ‘stowed’ in the position furthest away from the seat and can be shifted towards you when you want to use it, but this means that in bed mode your feet are under that table and it’s possible that someone with large feet might find this annoying. It wasn’t really an issue for us but it seemed a questionable design choice. Additionally, the seat is already scuffed and marked in places – this seems to be an issue with many seats but we wonder if there isn’t something to be done about this. Considering how new they are, these seats shouldn’t look as if they’re getting old yet.



There are no doors to these suites and it’s possible that if every seat were occupied you might see other passengers more than you might prefer to in First, but it felt private enough to us on a half-full flight at least.

Where to sit



Travelers in a pair will likely prefer the center seats, though we always like a window seat and considering you can sit across from each other in the suite to chat or dine whenever you like, the seats along the side might not be a terrible choice either. For solo travelers, 2A or 2K are going to be ideal as they’re away from the galley to the rear and the lounge area, stairs and lavatory to the front.

Service - inflight

Service is one area where Thai Airways offers a mixed experience. Flight attendants are always friendly and willing to help, in our experience, but they don’t seem to have the attention to detail, efficiency and confidence that the best flight attendants manage in First. They tend to come across as inexperienced. It should be noted that we’re being especially picky here because it’s First.



One point where service was particularly sub-par: flight attendants took both dinner orders and breakfast orders before takeoff, then carted away the menus and never reappeared with them. A passenger may not know what they want for breakfast eight hours ahead of time, and furthermore, if menus are only going to be used for the 20 minutes before takeoff, why bother printing them at all?

Food & drink

Considering the range of flavor and generally high quality of Thai cuisine, the food on Thai Airways should really be some of the best out there. Unfortunately, it’s not. We’re not saying it’s terrible, it’s just nothing to rave about – and that’s an area where Thai could really work to improve and distinguish itself better.



Thai does offer a pre-order menu which is said to be better than the standard onboard offer. That information can be found here. We decided to order off the regular menu and had a pork dish with peanut sauce and Chinese style rice and steamed vegetables. It was fine, but not particularly memorable. For breakfast we had a western-style meal with large portions – it was also fine. Plenty of fruit, which was nice.



The champagne is currently a 2004 vintage Dom Perignon – very tasty and no complaints there. Other than that there’s not much of interest on the drinks side, and frustratingly, the menu doesn’t list the brands of spirits on offer. There’s a big range in quality for every spirit and Thai doesn’t seem to feel the need to show off what they have. Guava juice and smoothie at breakfast were decent, but the coffee was disappointing. We’re not sure if the cappuccino is from a real espresso machine or not, but it tasted more like something that originated in powder form. The black coffee, to be fair, tasted more genuine.

Service - ground

Thai Airways is famous for its exceptional First ground service in Bangkok, but originating in Frankfurt you’ll get nothing much. There is a nice, newer Lufthansa Senator lounge near the gate but there’s no access to the Lufthansa First Class lounge. Someone will escort First passengers from the lounge to the aircraft but this isn’t very clearly communicated. The boarding channel for First passengers is also the channel for Business passengers meaning no quick and easy access to the aircraft unless you’re with an escort or park yourself at the front of the growing queue in advance of boarding.



In the case of our flight, a creeping delay, which was very poorly communicated, resulted in dozens of people crowding around the gate and creating a chaotic scene which Thai did nothing much to deal with. Additionally, once on the plane, the extent of the delay was seemingly hidden from us. The purser, when introducing herself to each of the First passengers, tried to downplay the extent of the problem, telling us that some tires had to be changed then estimating a 15 minute delay at most, which sounded very unlikely. Google flight tracking told us our flight would be taking off around two hours late well before the Captain ever owned up to that fact. Clear information is what’s needed – not periodic, unrealistic updates.



In Bangkok the ground staff made up for it though, allowing us to make a five-minute connection to our onward flight to Hong Kong. We never even saw the interior of BKK airport – instead we were taken down the stairs from the jetbridge, into a waiting van, and then up the stairs to our next aircraft. It was, in fact, the shortest time we’ve ever had on the ground between flights – we were airborne to HKG within about 15 minutes of landing at Bangkok.

Entertainment

Entertainment is middle-of-the-road. The system doesn’t compare with the likes of Cathay Pacific or Singapore Airlines, but there’s a decent selection of on-demand movies, television shows and music that will surely serve the purpose of passing a few hours. Phitek noise-canceling headphones work well enough.



Onboard offerings

Wifi is available inflight for the insane price of US$14.50 per 10MB. At that price you’d have to be pretty desperate to get online.

A pillow, duvet and sheet are on offer for when it’s time to sleep. They’re not especially luxurious, they come in an odd mix of yellows and purples, and the pillow seems more designed for sitting with than for sleeping. We’d prefer a cozier set of white linens. However the seat itself is very comfortable as a bed and doesn’t really need any additional padding, which is great.



The pajamas are comfortable if not particularly high-quality. They come folded inside of what seems to double as a laptop sleeve – a nice idea although it’s unlikely we’ll ever use it for that purpose. Meanwhile the purple Rimowa amenity kit is a highlight and very collectible.

Where to find it

Thai’s A380 currently flies between Bangkok Suvarnabhumi (BKK) and Osaka Kansai (KIX), Tokyo Narita (NRT), Frankfurt (FRA), and Paris (CDG). Many of Thai’s 747-400s have now been outfitted with a very similar new seat in First, and those serve a wider range of destinations, but keep in mind it’s still possible to get stuck with the older First product on the 747 and Thai likes to swap aircraft frequently so it’s hard to be sure. Every A380 has the new First.