Etihad’s A350 takes its first flight, unveiling its Club Suite-cloned business seat

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• David Richards says:

  2 Apr2 April 06:36

  Some very good reviews of this already online, the best one IMHO at https://www.executivetraveller.com/news/review-etihad-a350-business-class, where the writer makes good points on how the EY seat differs from the BA one. Wireless changing is a great feature, as is USB-C as well as USB-A charging, but the ‘hidden’ location of those USB ports is definitely frustrating!

  • Rob says:

    2 Apr2 April 09:26

    Finnair has wireless charging too – I found it very impressive.

• Ross says:

  2 Apr2 April 07:44

  You might want to check your sources. The A380 is coming back end of May.

  • Andrew M says:

    2 Apr2 April 09:55

    Etihad’s A380s returning in May? That would be good news. Do you have a source for this?

    • Sam says:

      2 Apr2 April 12:28

      Oh the irony

  • Benilyn says:

    2 Apr2 April 11:34

    Are flights loaded up? I heard the rumour of it coming back but have been waiting…

• rj24 says:

  2 Apr2 April 07:51

  Doug Thomas or Tony Douglas? 🙂

• Harry T says:

  2 Apr2 April 09:38

  New seat looks lovely. I’m a big fan of club suite and I like the design Etihad have gone with.

• Babyg says:

  2 Apr2 April 10:25

  Like BA’s seat they look nice, but like the Club Suite these wont be great when travelling as a family or even as a couple. Its a lazy design(copy+paste) with form given priority over function. Qsuite for me thanks.

  • Mark says:

    2 Apr2 April 14:34

    Except even if you choose to fly with Qatar you may still end up in a Collins Super Diamond seat. I’ve also noted that QSuite, although clearly innovative and popular, is not universally loved – claustrophobic being a description I’ve seen a few times (though to be fair I’ve seen people describe Club Suite in the same way).

    Having never flown on Qatar I’m curious to know how they manage seat selection in order to assign the blocks out to families / couples, especially given their apparent propensity to switch aircraft types/configurations, and therefore hard product, around.

    • Babyg says:

      2 Apr2 April 18:53

      Yeah been on the Qatar Super Diamond, but it works better for couples/families as they dint have the doors walls 1970s kitchen hatch. I have seen the odd comments around people who feel claustrophobic – which as you mentioned would feel the same in any business class with walls/doors etc., at least with qusite you have the options to open doors, walls, dividers etc (depending on how many in your party) to create a big space, whilst with Club suite you can open the door and the little hatch. In Etihad a350 and CS family members are forced into their own cubicle, and the useless “hatch” between the middle seats is sub optimal for anything other than brief conversation, in fact the old clubworld seat is much better when travelling as a family over the new instagramable Club Suite.

      • Mark says:

        2 Apr2 April 19:32

        Each to their own, I guess. We thought Club Suite was a big step up, travelling as a couple. We both like window seats though and appreciated the feeling that it was quite private. We’ve also have got accustomed to “travelling alone together” over the years. I’d say in general of the products we’ve flown, the ones that we’ve preferred have been the more private ones (Etihad Business Studio, Iberia, BA First, BA Club Suite) and (with the possible exception of QSuite) you can’t normally have it both ways.

        • Babyg says:

          2 Apr2 April 22:40

          exactly, ClubSuite (and Etihad’s clone by the looks of thing) is only really designed for solo travellers…

    • Rob says:

      2 Apr2 April 18:59

      You don’t get open seat selection until close to departure. You are offered blocks suitable for the size of your group so a solo traveller cannot book a seat which forms part of a foursome.

      • Mark says:

        2 Apr2 April 19:11

        I see. So what happens if you have people travelling together on different bookings?

        • Rob says:

          2 Apr2 April 19:37

          Tough, unless there is a way of calling to link them which would unlock the seat map.

        • Babyg says:

          2 Apr2 April 22:38

          its not a problem – i needed to book my family on separate bookings (QR only release 2 reward seats per fligh, long story short we got more than two seats with some trickery, if o seperate bookings just DM @qrsupport and they will put your party into a qusuite quad.

• Richie says:

  2 Apr2 April 12:09

  Looks great. Only 11 rows in the J cabin. Good news for the Sky team collectors.

  • Mark says:

    2 Apr2 April 14:37

    Identical to BA’s forward A350 cabin then (although BA also has the smaller cabin behind with a further 3 rows).

    • Richie says:

      2 Apr2 April 19:25

      Etihad has two toilets at the front, BA has one.

• ChrisBCN says:

  2 Apr2 April 13:14

  What on earth is a ’boutique airline’?

  From the dictionary – ‘a small shop selling fashionable clothes or accessories’. Will Etihad sell me an outfit for my dog onboard?

  • Jacob says:

    2 Apr2 April 15:08

    You might want to look beyond the first definition, the second one within the same dictionary says “used to describe a small fashionable business that sells a particular product or service:
    – boutique hotel.
    – a boutique grocery/market/winery”

    • ChrisBCN says:

      2 Apr2 April 15:37

      And how does it fit that definition?

      • Jacob says:

        2 Apr2 April 16:10

        Same as boutique hotel? Focusing on style, quality and aesthetics, not on quantity or masses…

        • ChrisBCN says:

          2 Apr2 April 16:37

          Article says it’s mid-sized, and it’s using pretty much the same seat as BA….

        • Bonglim says:

          3 Apr3 April 20:40

          Same seat as BA…… with a special light!

        • Rob says:

          3 Apr3 April 21:52

          The spec is reportedly a lot higher in terms of what was spent on materials etc.

• john says:

  4 Apr4 April 09:47

  The light does look nice, although you can see in the photo there is spill over from the seat in front to the one behind at the window which isn’t ideal..

  • Rhys says:

    4 Apr4 April 09:56

    What is that, 2 inches of spillover? I think you’ll survive!

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