FLIGHT REVIEW: New Air France A350-900 Business Class Suite Part 2 – Better Than BA?

In this review, I will mainly look at the seat as I did not eat or drink anything on the flight except breakfast since it departed at midnight, and I needed to sleep. In the next review, I will look at the return journey, where I availed myself of all the food and drink and also tried the new mega-suite (free to select).

Check-in

Prior to check-in, we received a text in plenty of time letting us know there was no Wi-Fi on the flight. I thought it was great to let people know so that they could be prepared. 

I had checked in online first and found the Air France app easy to use. We checked in quite early at LAX and there was no queue. A sign on the desk with the new details of the lounge was helpful. The staff were efficient and friendly.

Unfortunately, you do not get any priority security at Los Angeles, and the queue was very, very long for my friend who did not have TSA pre-clearance. I have it through Global Entry, which I highly recommend if you visit the US regularly. I only waited a couple of minutes at most in my queue. 

Lounge

Air France opened their refurbished lounge last year and I was impressed with my visit. Highlights included a manned bar with cocktails, food to order as well as a nicely presented buffet and a Clarins spa. You can find my full review here.

Boarding

Boarding was announced in the lounge and we were quite close to the gate in the lounge. Unfortunately there was then a long wait at the gate before they called business class. It did feel a bit chaotic and they could have done with more announcements to keep people up to date. This would be one of the few criticisms in my review. 

Once on board the cabin crew were extremely friendly (I have found this to be very consistent on Air France). I was offered a welcome drink of champagne or water. Naturally, I took the champagne (it was a decent measure, I’d already drunk some in the photo!) A bottle of Evian was also at the seat.  

The amenity kit contained:

• A pair of earplugs,
• A night mask made entirely from recycled material,
• A bamboo toothbrush and a tube of toothpaste organic and made in France,
• 2 beauty products from Clarins, a Beauty Flash Balm and a Moisturizing and Quenching Matte Gel (travel size),
• A kraft pen and a pair of socks made from recycled material

I love a Clarins product and was happy with the products to take away, but would have preferred something like a hand cream or lip balm instead of the Beauty Flash balm. It felt a bit “samey” to have two facial products.

The cabin crew also handed out menus and offered to hang jackets. I also noticed them helping some people with their hand luggage. I found them very charming. Slippers were also provided. 

Cabin and seats

Air France Airbus A350-900 aircraft seat map . Provided by seatmaps.com

The business class cabin is divided into two sections. I was in the front cabin in 6L. All seats are not created equal as the entire front row of each cabin has much bigger seats, but they were all booked on this leg.

I was in seat 6L. All seats are suites with a door in a 1-2-1 layout. The centre seats have a divider which can be lowered. Unlike BA, seat selection is free in advance even with no status. 

Like their other business class designs, there is a personal storage unit that comes equipped with a noise-cancelling headset, a vanity mirror, but not space for customers’ belongings.

There is a small side compartment, too, which is big enough for a small ladies’ handbag. 

A second storage area has also been added at the foot of the seat 

The tablet controls your environment, from adjusting the position of your seat to adapting the lighting intensity. A “do not disturb” feature is also included on the screen. 

I found the seat comfortable for working and sleeping, I particularly liked that you can adjust several aspects of the seat to get the perfect position or you can use the presets. You can either use the tablet to do this, which I found the easier option.

Or you can use the controls by the seat which are easier to reach when lying down.

There was also a large solid table which would be suitable for working on. The windows on new Airbus are now the self-dimming ones that you get on Boeing 787 Dreamliners. However, these were much more efficient and blocked out all the lightly effectively. 

For sleeping, there was a good-sized pillow and a lightish duvet which felt slightly silky. I don’t like anything too thick as I often find it too hot on board.

The footwell felt quite generous and because of the configuration there was less chance of banging your knees on it if you turned over as it was not that deep. I also liked the extra room by the small side storage which was perfect for someone like me that sleeps on their right side. With the door shut and do not disturb on, I found it very private. Often, new aircraft seats are quite hard, but I did not find that with these seats. 

When I visited the toilets, I found them very clean with fresh flowers. They have cotton pads, Clarins Toner and their refreshing spa scent Eau Dynamisante for you to help yourself to. They even had motion sensors for the rubbish bin! There was also a magnifying mirror which was a useful if slightly scary option after an overnight flight!

Food and drink

Since it was nearly midnight, I did not bother to eat dinner. You can order your main course in advance on most routes but not Tahiti. I have pre-ordered before and found it worked well.

Here is the food menu: (Apologies, it is in French. You can tell I was tired as I can understand French, so I was reading the French menu!)

In English, there was a mango and tuna salad as an appetiser, seared beef, fish with mushrooms, chicken with souffle potatoes or vegetarian millefeuille with pepper sauce, and then cheese and dessert. You could also have a light supper with starter, cheese, and dessert which being cold would come out quicker. I thought this was all pretty good for such a late flight. 

I had never heard of the champagne they were serving, De Saint-Gall, but I enjoyed it.

Here is the drinks menu:

I had breakfast in the morning, which came with yogurt, some lovely fresh fruit (none of the usual underripe hard and sour fruit you usually get), granola, a warm croissant, high-quality French butter, and a decent coffee. You could also have an omelette as well which came with tomato, potato rosti and mushrooms. 

Entertainment and connectivity

Each seat features a wide 20-inch 4K Ultra High-Definition anti-glare screen – the largest of any Business cabin across the Air France long-haul fleet. I love that it has a Bluetooth connection, which allows passengers to use their personal headphones, as I have never found a perfect wireless connection for use on board.

The new touchpad screen, which is like a tablet, also allows you to browse programs and control the entertainment. You can also pair your mobile phone to the system using Bluetooth, and then you can use your own phone as a remote control. If you use the touchpad or phone pairing you can have different content on the screens. You can also browse the entertainment and look at the moving map on your phone while connected and have something different on the main screen.

The noise cancelling headphones were comfortable and worked reasonably well, but I soon paired my own headphones to it, which was very simple and was pretty flawless. There were plenty of recent English-language films and TV programs to watch. 

The seat also has USB-A and USB-C ports, as well as a multi-country socket and wireless charging.

Conclusion

I was very impressed with the new seats. I would rate them better than BA as I found them more comfortable for sleeping as a side sleeper, and I also liked all the new technology, such as Bluetooth pairing for your phone and headphones. I slightly prefer the Qatar QSuite for a day flight as it feels a bit more spacious, and the storage is slightly better, but for sleeping, I found this better.

This was my second recent long-haul flight with Air France, and it was the crew that shocked me most. I must admit I was maybe expecting a certain “Parisian” attitude, but on all the flights I did, the crew could not have been more charming as well as professional. Their age also stood out as they were generally a more experienced crew, which probably helped. 

The breakfast I had was fine, and with the omelette it would have been pretty filling. I thought the drinks selection was also good. 

Note, if you are planning to fly this route, book during a sale or far in advance as prices start from around £2750 for the 8 hour flight and soon rise to well over £3000.