icegirl

This should help you decide quickly.

escape4

The catering can be a matter of taste. I do not like BA's but it's certainly not the worst in the sky.

However this thread is talking about the seat. Business class seats are worse in Europe compared to just about anywhere else in the world, but is BA the worst of the worst? Maybe there are some obscure airlines which are indeed worst and if so then I will be happy to lump BA with such airlines. But if we're talking about comparing with airlines that BA aspires to compare itself with, then perhaps BA has the worst seat, or tied for worst. Is there an airline that sells genuine business class (not PY) 3-3 with no blocked middle seat? Maybe there are (I have not flown every airline out there) so I would be curious who it is. And is there any airline with seat pitch less than BA in business class (30)? Some are equally bad such as LH. I see on seatguru 29 seat pitch for OS on an Embraer but 1-1 layout so I would give up the 1 inch seat pitch for 1-1 instead of 3-3 with blocked middle. I checked a few other airlines quickly on seatguru and I cannot find any major airline objectively worse than BA. I think LH = BA in last place. Someone mentioned Air Serbia in this thread, according to seatguru seat pitch is 39, leaving BA and LH in the dust.

Back to the comparison Europe vs rest of the world (which is a different discussion), I can imagine someone who prefers 3-3 with blocked middle seat to 2-2 without a middle seat because they are further away from their neighbor. Personally I do not, but anyway the deal killer is seat pitch. Airlines with 2-2 usually have much better seat pitch in J than BA.

Further away from topic, on the A320 I prefer a window seat in the last row of Air Canada Y next to toilets than BA CE. At least I have IFE, power for phone / laptop, and better seat pitch too. And wifi (although not directly seat-related). What I give up for all that is some probability that there might be someone sitting next to me if the flight is completely full, in that case the middle seat in the last row won't be empty

nivsy

As an observation Mrs nivsy had a complaint while sitting in 1c the other day. The gentlemen behind in 2c who was not tall by any stretch had his knees against the back of her chair and as such was digging into her back (A320). She did pass comment that it was verging on ridiculous that this is termed as Business Class while emergency exit seats were somewhat roomier. It is a shame that BC is seen to be in many ways a rip off and the priority boarding for bus gate apparently just meant earlier on the bus which never left to aircraft until it was rammed.

Greenpen

MrAOK

In answer to one question above, I generally fly economy to Europe and in the few instances I've flown Business, it's been from the US to or from Europe, not the inter European routes. Last year I flew Turkish business class including routes from FCO and ATH to IST and I don't remember the business class seats being the same as coach seats.

What surprised me was the use of these seats on the 4 hour ATH-LHR flight, not on far shorter inter-Europe routes.

BA makes a big point of how much wider its seats for World Traveler Plus are for premium economy on intercontinental flights than regular economy, then turns around and offers Business class travelers seats on intereuropean flights seats with the same width and recline as many coach passengers, It's pretty odd.

bse118

And those WTP travelers will end up in regular Y when they get on to their intra-European connecting legs. The product that BA markets for it's intercontinental flights is not the product that it markets or offers for it's intra-Europe flights.

That same A320 might end up on an LHR-CDG or LHR-MAN or LHR-AMS on it's next leg. It's not always operating 4hr stage lengths.

As pointed out up thread - Turkish is an outlier. LH, OS, AF, KL, etc all have an-intra Europe business class that is basically the same as BA's.

It's not odd. It's the European airline approach to intra-Europe J. It's not the US standard, and it may be inferior to that product, but it is also not the US. There was no need to be surprised: a couple of minutes of pre-trip research on the BA website would have told you what to expect,

escape4

Please see each airline’s A320 or B737 unless noted otherwise based on seatguru (I did not check all aircraft types). Please correct me if something looks wrong. For layout, the number represents how many seats on each side of the aisle, and 3B means 3 on each side but middle seat blocked

Airline, Seat Pitch, Layout

Clearly Better than BA:
Air Serbia 39 2
Aeroflot 38 2
LOT 37 3B (but B737Max is 34 3B)
Turkish 34 3B
Air France 34 3B
Swiss 34 3B
Aegean 33 3B
KLM 33 3B
Alitalia 32 3B
Croatia 32 3B

Arguably Better than BA:
Austrian 29 1 (Embraer E195)
TAP 32 3 (width 22)

Very Similar to BA:
Finnair 31 3B
Iberia 31 3B
Czech 31 3B (A319)
Lufthansa 30 3B (width 18)
Brussels 30 3B (width 17.5)
British Airways 30 3B (width 17)

Aer Lingus no J
SAS no J

A few comments:

TAP has 3 on each side of the aisle for both J and Y (no middle seat blocked), but seat width shows 22 in J and 18 in Y, is that right? If those numbers are correct, then TAP is better than BA by 2 for pitch and 5 for width, but in return you might have someone sitting next to you if J is quite full.

Austrian has the worst seat pitch, but only 1 seat on each side of the aisle so arguably better than BA.

Finnair, Iberia, and Czech almost the same as BA but 1 better for pitch. Lufthansa and Brussels are equally bad as BA with pitch 30, but seat width is a bit better.

Not sure about carriers outside Europe, but based on this, BA indeed arguably has the worst J seat in the sky, unless other aircraft types would show differences. I could see the argument for BA>TAP for full flights, but that’s about it.

LTN Phobia

Talking about the seat pitch is OK as a rough measure but really, because of the seat "thickness" variability it is no longer particularly an accurate indication of the actual legroom.

ThatT1Feeling

Yes, there has to be a cutoff somewhere and the ATH flights are certainly among the longest flights using this type of Club Europe configuration.

corporate-wage-slave

That's absolutely correct. There are several problems here, some of those figures don't look right to me, they look like seatguru figures and there are well known problems with that source. Serbia is identical to BA (and has a very limited network), it changed last year. TK is fundamentally a 2 - 2 seat and they also run longhaul seats on shorthaul sectors. Pitch also made sense when there was essentially one or two airline seats in the sky but that changed many moons ago and the thickness difference between a legacy Alitalia or AF seat and (e.g.) BA means it's very difficult to see that Alitalia or AF has a better product. Finally with Hop! and EuroWings on one hand, BACF on the other, on any given route it's very easy to end up with apples and pears. LOT, BA, Hop! have good Embraer arrangements, AY do not. So all you can do is look at a particular route, do the research, and see perhaps very little choice. On LHR-ATH direct the material choices are BA, A3 and LCC.

LTN Phobia

I think a new standard legroom measure should be introduced, measuring the (horizontal) distance between where the back rest and the seat cushion join, to whatever you hit first in front of you.

Cap'n Benj

cupsandsaucers

Completely agree. And premium (proper CW/F) seats should be measured in SqFt personal space per Pax. I believe some review sites and Etihad already do this. (no doubt to tout their suites) but it should be a good benchmark. That would put an end to the constant density arguments.

ILikePancakes

Air Serbia used to have those seats. They've since replaced all of the seats with the thin Recaro seats (including business), and reduced the pitch. I'd guess it's around 32" for the first 4 rows, then 29" for the rest. So I'd say BA CE is better.

flylikelinz