Longtime lurker, first time poster. I'm no globetrotter and only fly occasionally but I've used this forum for advice several times in the past.

A few months ago I booked a round trip flight from SAN to HND in ANA economy for me and my wife. Both directions are on a 777-300ER and have a stop in SFO. I specifically picked ANA because I'm 6'3" so the 34" seat pitch was important, plus it seems service on Japanese airlines is just better overall. I read recent reviews before booking including a recent one on SANSpotter where he flew my exact itinerary which state the seats are comfortable and recline, but then I saw a recent video stating the seats don't recline and aren't comfortable.

That prompted me to look into things further and I discovered that some older ANA 777-300s have fixed back "pod" seats in economy which don't recline in a normal way so you're not disturbing the passenger behind you. Apparently the bottom seat cushion slides forward instead? I did some further research and it seems that older planes with 2-4-3 configuration in economy do indeed have these pod seats, and not the normal recline seats I was expecting. My flight is 2-4-3 both ways, so unfortunately I think that's what I'm getting.

Does anyone here have experience with these seats? Seatguru reviews seem to be very negative, but most are 4+ years old and I've seen recent comments elsewhere saying the opposite, that the seats were pretty comfy. Has something changed? At this point I don't know what to believe, but it's a redeye flight leaving at 1:30AM and I already have trouble sleeping on planes, so now I'm extra concerned about whether I'll be able to sleep. I was planning to dope myself up on anything I can to knock me out so I can hit the ground running when I land at 4:30AM, but now I'm very concerned about lack of comfort keeping me awake. Any feedback here?

Ironically I just checked seat assignments and despite picking seats at time of booking (through United, but the SFO-HNA is actually operated by ANA), my wife doesn't have a seat assignment right now. Not sure what happened but that may give us an opportunity to change or upgrade seats if we really want, but from what I recall the price difference we pretty major.