jd20

How does ANA compare to Korean Air or JAL for families? I'm booking a one way from SFO to ICN and NRT for a family of 6 (4 ticketed pax, and 2 infants) for Summer 2019. The ANA hard and soft product looks really nice, I'd presumably have access to new Polaris lounge in SFO, and I'd be using Aeroplan miles (much more than an ANA roundtrip award I know, but at least the infant fees are far less with Aeroplan, like $200 vs $2000).

The thing that has me worried, is that ANA F on 777 doesn't look very amenable to couples: the seats are kind of narrow (tough when you have infants), a big divider that can't be put down, no jump seat for two people to dine together, and the walls seem to block most of the windows. The KE 747-8i (if it doesn't get switched out last minute) seems a lot more spacious, plus two can easily dine together (just food doesn't look as appetizing as ANA). JAL 777 F has really wide seats (if a bit aging) and as good (maybe better?) soft product than ANA.

I've never flown any of these (only CX in F), so would love to get some feedback. Which would you choose, and why?

roberto99

The First and Business seats on the NH 777-300 are not good for couples. They are designed for privacy.

Although narrower than the CX F seats, the NH F seats are not too narrow at all.

Unlike CX F, I prefer that the NH F cabin has overhead bins.

I love the service I get in both NH First and Business.

CPH-Flyer

Getting 4 first class award seats on NH would require a bit of miracle. You could potentially get 2 355 days out when they release inventory and then hope for short notice availabiluty. JAL would be same flow with 330 days out.

The NH seat is same width as JAL, and I would hardly call it narrow, even among F seats.

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Tokyoite

for families, economy class is best on ANA. Long haul business class (business staggered) is designed for single business men/women on business trips, so it is not fun for a family. Neither are JAL, KOREAN AIR or ASIANA. You would need to "downgrade yourself" to a 2-2-2 or 2-3-2 business class cabin to actually have any proximity to each other (US airlines come to mind).

jd20

Thanks for the feedback, that seemed about what I expected... the NH F seat doesn't allow two people to dine together, right? It looks like there's a small bench to rest your feet, but a fixed shelf would prevent a person from sitting there.

We're planning to travel split F/J (unless 4 F open up last minute, as you mention). The seat width is a funny thing: SeatGuru says the JAL and ANA seats are both 33 inches, and Korean Air 24, but from photos the ANA and Korean Air one really look the same (must be some optical illusion going on with the ANA seat, making it appear narrower in pictures).

Agreed that the ANA J seats are pretty isolated from each other, Korean Air looks better in that regard though (being 2-2-2 and with a divider that can be put down between seats). My wife ruled out traveling economy with two infants, too stressful

roberto99

seatguru has THOUSANDS of errors and/or incorrect assumptions.

roberto99

The shelf below the monitor in F certainly prevents sitting on the footrest.

IIRC NH also does a good job of blocking off the curtains between F and J to prevent traffic between the 2 cabins. FA's DESPISE pax visiting other cabins!

I suspect that bringing 2 infants into either F or J will get many bad vibes from many other pax. Best of luck on your trip!

jd20

It's always a possibility, though not bringing our kids isn't an option for this trip. The last two times we flew with our son in CX F when he was 1 and 2, and it went very smoothly. FA's were very accomodating, and cabin was mostly empty anyway. Never had to do the split F/J thing before, but I'd expect there's no back-and-forth traffic between cabins.

5khours

Currently in JL F over the Pacific. JL is a slightly better choice than NH or CX. (Don't fly KE enough to comment.) Seats are little roomier and more comfortable. Seats are designed for dining together. Don't think infants will be problem. On my last JL flight I was in J, and my seat mate was a mother with infant. The CA took the baby, gave her a bottle and walked her around for 15 or 20 minutes while the mom was eating. When my kids were infants, they flew up front quite a bit. No on complained.

CPH-Flyer

As long as the parents are well behaved, I don't see any problem with infants in F or J. Sure they sometimes cry a bit, but on the sum of things I would say kids and infants on flights have caused me less annoyance than adults have. :-)

24left

Exactly and this point is mentioned often on so many of the FT forums where there is an assumption of accuracy.

Seatguru can provide a general idea of cabin layout, but along with errors, the biggest issues I find are those airlines with more than one configuration of an aircraft type eg. 777

IMHO and based on what I've found best for viewing cabin layout and seating, is ANA's own website. I also use EF and occasionally, will search for a recent review from a generally accurate travel writer (some of whom include seat maps in their reviews. This tends to be more important the first time I fly a type of aircraft with an airline.)

24left

It is not really amenable to couples and less so families, and I assume it was intentionally designed that way. I think ANA caters to a certain demographic who want quiet and privacy. Some airlines won't even allows babies or very young children in F. Some people don't like that, but some airlines have listened to their customers and made their F cabins more private.

I flew EY F Apartments. Two guys in 2 other apartments near me were trying to work and sleep on the 15 hour flight, but a baby cried the for almost the entire flight. Cabin manager told the guys that the airline doesn't allow babies in F, so no one could explain how this couple were there.

OTOH, I've flown LH F a number of times and had a dinner companion on a few of the flights. Their storage bench seemed to be well designed for seating and their F seats are not enclosed like ANA.

And BTW, if you look at the seating design of the wide body business class cabins on AC, some AA aircraft, CX, BR, SQ - some of those 1-2-1 seating pods are also not designed for people travelling together nor children. I do find it amusing that some people complain about some of these designs, yet their desire to fly J/C overrides their annoyance and the difficulty in communicating.

Airlines like LH, LX, TK etc with their 2-2-2 business cabins, seem to be the place if you want ease of communication with travel partners or family.

jd20

Honestly, I don't think any cabin / airline is really designed with families being a top priority. If they did, economy seats wouldn't have those terrible fixed arm rests, that force children to sleep upright (which is really difficult, even dangerous for infants).

That's interesting, I didn't know EY forbids infants? I don't see it in their terms, and I tried a dummy booking for an infant and it seemed to go through OK... a baby crying an entire flight is no fun for sure, for either passengers or parents.

What I've found worked well for us, on CX F we had two booked seats (and our son who was an infant at the time). When he was napping, me and my wife sat in one seat (using the jump seat so we could face each other and talk), and he slept in the other seat across the aisle (he had a huge bed all to himself). When he was awake, he just sat in the seat with us (the CX seat is so wide, an adult and child can sit side-by-side no problem), or the FA's played games with him. We've done a couple CX J flights with him too, but they were red-eye so we pretty much all slept (not much need to communicate). Even the CX J seats are big enough, that sleeping with an infant is very comfortable. Definitely superior to economy, IMO.

joejones

I will submit that JAL's Sky Suite is the best business class seat for traveling with children. It's a totally flat bed, and can be closed off from its neighbor(s), but you can also take the partition down to see/talk to the person next to you. Traveling with a baby some time ago, we booked a block of three seats in the middle, let the baby have the middle seat, turned it into bed mode after takeoff, and voila! playpen/crib in the sky.

The ANA staggered seats are terrible for traveling with children because you can't reach or even see them. Herringbone seats on other carriers are somewhat better, but there's still a great deal of separation.

jd20

Thanks, I think we may try this next time. This time around, we're doing KE and SQ, and cut Japan out of our itinerary (will do it as a separate trip). NH is rolling out new suites on HNL-SFO next year, but looks like it will take a while for award availability to materialize, so I'm probably looking at JAL instead, realistically. Wish they would freshen up the JL1/JL2 (SFO-HND) seats, from what I recall it's pretty old and worn out (although big and wide, as you mention).