The world’s most spacious Economy Class seats

Summary

• Japan Airlines and All Nippon Airways offer a comfortable seat pitch of 34 inches and thus sufficient legroom in their aircraft.

• Air Premia, a South Korean airline, takes it a step further with a generous 35-inch seat pitch on its Boeing 787-9s.

• Contour Airlines features 36-inch seat pitch in its Embraer aircraft in the United States, providing a comfortable experience for passengers.

For many passengers, comfortable seat pitch can make all the difference to the inflight experience, especially on longer flights. There are still a limited number of airlines around the world that offer passengers seat pitches of 34 inches or more. Such spacious seats are reminiscent of the early years of commercial flying and more akin to what is found in some airline premium economy cabins today.

Seat pitch is the distance from any point on a seat to the exact same point on the seat in front or behind. While there is an indication of legroom, the two do not always correlate exactly as legroom can also be affected by a number of other factors including seat cushion thickness and the location of onboard entertainment equipment.

Based on data from ch-aviation.com, what are the five airlines that fly the most generously in terms of seat pitch today?

5 Japan Airlines

Japan Airlines comes in fifth with a more than comfortable seat pitch of 34 inches. The Japanese carrier’s generous seat pitch can be found on six of its 43 Boeing 737-800s, ten of its 27 767-300ERs and all twelve of its 777-300ERs.

Photo: Markus Mainka | Shutterstock

Japan Airlines’ Sky Wider Economy product was launched back in 2013 and received rave reviews from passengers. The airline will take its business class product to the next level later this year when it unveils the interior of its Airbus A350-1000 on October 2. Japan Airlines is due to receive its first A350-1000 later this year and has ordered 13 in total.

4 All Nippon Airways

Japanese airline All Nippon Airways also offers 34-inch seat pitch, but on a much larger number of aircraft. The airline’s redesigned, sleek economy class seats can currently be found on three of its 36 Boeing 787-8s, 32 of its 40 787-9s, three 787-10s and five of its 13 777-300ERs.

Photo: Daisuke Shimizu | Shutterstock

It’s important to note that there are a handful of other airlines that also offer 34-inch seat pitch on multiple aircraft types, including Air India, Oman Air and Thai Airways International, as well as low-cost carriers Air Arabia and JetBlue. For the purposes of this list, they ended up behind All Nippon Airways and Japan Airlines because they had a smaller total number of aircraft with 34-inch seat pitch.

3 Air Bonuses

South Korean newcomer Air Premia offers a generous 35-inch seat pitch on three of its five Boeing 787-9s, registered HL8387, HL8388 and HL8389. The aircraft will be operated from the Air Premia base at Incheon International Airport (ICN), from where the company has been offering a unique hybrid budget service since it went into service two years ago in August 2021.

Photo: Markus Mainka | Shutterstock

The airline operates its 787 on a number of regional and long-haul routes and recently announced the upcoming launch of services to its third US destination – Honolulu (HNL). Beginning in December 2023, Air Premia’s US route network will include Honolulu, along with Los Angeles (LAX) and Newark (EWR). In addition to charter flights to Dhaka (DAC), Oslo (OSL) and Barcelona (BCN), the airline also started scheduled flights to Frankfurt (FRA) at the beginning of the year.

2 Contour Airlines

Contour Airlines is an American charter airline that operates regional flights on behalf of Contour Aviation and also has an interline agreement with American Airlines. The airline began operations in March 2016 and now flies to 28 destinations in the United States with a fleet of 28 aircraft (of which 22 are currently active).

Photo: Markus Mainka | Shutterstock

Passengers on 16 of the airline’s 20 Embraer aircraft will be treated to an impressive 36-inch seat pitch. The aircraft are eight Embraer ERJ-135, six ERJ-140 and two ERJ-145. Passengers also benefit from leather seats and free snacks and drinks on board.

1 Hello Air Korea

Topping the list is another South Korean airline, Hi Air Korea. The airline’s fleet consists of four ATR 72-500s, offering each of the 50 passengers an incredibly generous 38-inch seat pitch. For comparison, this is the same seat pitch as found in many premium economy cabins around the world, including those operated by United Airlines and Virgin Atlantic.

Hi Air Korea is based at Ulsan Airport (USN) in South Korea and focuses on domestic flights. The airline currently flies to just one international destination — Kitakyushu Airport (KKJ) in Japan, and its 38-inch seat pitch should provide more than ample legroom for its short-haul network.

This list of the five most generous seat pitches in the world holds a few surprises: The most generous seat pitches of all are found on airlines that operate short domestic and regional flights.

How important is seat spacing to you when flying? Do you select an airline specifically based on seat pitch? Did any of the airlines on this list surprise you? Share your thoughts and experiences by commenting below.

Source: ch-aviation.com