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Take a look at Iberia’s new A321XLR business class seat

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Later this year, Iberia will be the first airline to take delivery of the extended-range Airbus A321XLR.

Internal IAG politics means that the Spanish flag carrier is leap-frogging its sister airline Aer Lingus which is in the midst of a pay dispute with its pilots.

Aer Lingus pilots want salary increases of over 20% whilst management are refusing to budge beyond 8.5%.

Review Iberia A321XLR

These days, all new aircraft orders are made centrally by IAG and management there are using the A321XLR as a stick in their negotiations. Until the pilots come to a deal with Aer Lingus it will defer all A321XLR deliveries for the airline, implicitly reducing flying time for pilots.

This means that Iberia will become the launch carrier when it takes delivery of its first aircraft “by the end of Summer.”

What the A321XLR means for Iberia

The A321XLR is the newest variant of the A321 family and extends the aircraft’s range even further, to 4,700 nautical miles. This puts it within spitting distance of 10 – 11 hour flights, including to the western United States and as far East as India and Sri Lanka.

This makes it a very attractive aircraft for long, thin routes where the capacity of a widebody aircraft with 300+ seats is too much.

Aer Lingus already operates its ‘long range’ sibling, the A321LR, whilst Iberia is expecting a fleet of eight A321XLRs. It has already confirmed that the first destinations are going to be Boston and Washington DC which are currently seasonal routes; the A321XLR will allow it to ramp down capacity during the quieter winter months without dropping the routes entirely.

Iberia is configuring its A321XLR with 14 lie-flat, direct aisle access business class seats and 168 economy seats for a total capacity of 182. A premium economy cabin is conspicuously absent.

Iberia’s new A321XLR business class seat

Since the aircraft is being used for flights of 8+ hours, it is only right that it will feature a proper, lie-flat seats in its business class cabin.

Iberia only just unveiled a new business class seat for its latest batch of A350s, based on the Recaro R7 model. Unfortunately, this staggered seat is not available for the narrower fuselage on the A321XLR, forcing Iberia to go seat shopping again.

Whilst no official announcement has been made, a low resolution photo (see below) of the new seat was accidentally posted on Iberia’s newsroom last week and spotted by reader Andy.

What is clear from the image above is that Iberia has selected the VantageSOLO seat from Northern Irish manufacturer Thompson Aero Seating. If it looks familiar, that’s because it is the same seat that JetBlue uses on its A321LR planes to London, which I reviewed here.

This is an inward-facing herringbone seat, which means you’ll be facing away from the windows and into the aisle. This is an unfortunate compromise that is down to the geometries of the cabin.

Although counter intuitive, the space between the aisle and the windows is actually wider than on widebody aircraft. This means that herringbone seats must be angled more horizontally in order to maintain the same density.

Unfortunately, this becomes a problem in outward-facing herringbones as the seat itself becomes an obstruction to the aisle. There is no easy way to avoid this. As you can see below, flyDubai’s latest lie-flat business class seat from Safran Seats overcomes this issue by slicing off the corner of the seat cushion, which raises questions around overall comfort when sitting.

Iberia’s A321XLR seat avoids this altogether by settling for an inward-facing herringbone.

Love is an open door

Visually, it’s in-keeping with Iberia’s new widebody business class seat, which I reviewed here. That means woven, warm-grey upholstery and light wood-effect finishes on hard surfaces such as the console table and and storage. Iberia’s signature red and yellow tones are only used as accent colours, including on the in-flight entertainment screen and likely inside some of the storage areas.

Unlike JetBlue, it looks like Iberia has opted to install the seat without a fully closing privacy door. That may be an unusual choice in 2024, when doored suites are the norm, but in this case I think Iberia has made the right choice.

The addition of doors on business class suites adds significant additional weight and complexity. According to independent aviation journalist John Walton, “a modern lightweight composite door would come in at about 8-10kg”, with some of the flexible panel solutions on the market a few kilos less.

In aviation, every additional kilo makes a difference. A door on every one of the 14 seats Iberia intends to install in business class would add an additional 140kg across the entire aircraft, which in turn increases the fuelburn on every flight. Across the entire life of the aircraft – some 20+ years – that can quickly add up to thousands of tons of fuel saved.

In this case, I think the trade-off in privacy versus weight and fuel is one worth making. That’s because I already find the Thompson VantageSOLO seat to be very private. On top of that, the inward facing herringbone means that you are protected from the comings and goings on the aisle, unlike outward facing herringbones where your head and shoulders are closest to the aisle. In my opinion, the door, whilst neat, adds little additional privacy or protection for this seat, so I can see why Iberia has gone without it.

Other things to look out for are 18-inch, 4K screens, hopefully with Bluetooth pairing.

“Each seat will have its own lighting system, which can be adjusted independently to the desired environment, while each seat will have its number backlit during night mode, so that it can be more easily found.”

I will be intrigued to see if Iberia’s version of the seat features the same clever laptop drawer as found on JetBlue’s Mint seat, which is one of the most useful storage areas I’ve ever used:

A question mark also remains over whether Iberia has opted for Thompson’s ‘business plus’ front row option, which would make the two bulkhead seats in row one substantially more spacious a la JetBlue’s Mint Studio. At present, Iberia treats all business class seats the same: could this change with the A321XLR?

For now, however, we will have to wait and see until Iberia reveals the seat in greater detail.

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Comments (67)

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

  • Nick says:
    8 Jun8 June 06:25

    That Safran Seat, which ‘slices off’ the corner of the seat cushion, looks preposterous, and, for someone that knows just a little bit about musculoskeletal issues, could cause problems with an uneven support of the legs and thighs. I sometimes despair at the designers here and/or the penny pinching accountants, who seem to want to ram in as many seats as possible/reduce weight, without giving enough thought to the passenger. or they simply don’t have sufficient knowledge of travel to do so anyway!

    • Richie says:
      8 Jun8 June 09:03

      Perhaps a temporary upholstered stool to fill in the corner.

    • BA Flyer IHG Stayer says:
      8 Jun8 June 10:38

      Stop with blaiming decisions like this on accountants.

      Accountants (and others) provide the data and cost options to allow others to take fully informed decisions.

      • TGLoyalty says:
        8 Jun8 June 10:42

        Does make me laugh every time I see that written. Like they’re the bad guys re designing every crap but themselves. They’ll report where you are vs your targets it’s the person responsible for delivering the project that ultimately chooses what to do and what not to do.

        • Richie says:
          8 Jun8 June 11:05

          Some accountants can’t do all of the total cost streams, make appropriate cost assumptions and cost exclusions, understand foregone earnings/revenues. If decision makers get a foggy picture, we should not be surprised when decisions seem a bit odd.

          • Nick says:
            8 Jun8 June 11:29

            Some fair comments, but in this case it actually involves ‘cutting corners’ too!

          • TGLoyalty says:
            8 Jun8 June 12:18

            All true but a good finance partner reminds you it’s not just about the finances but the customer experience… the qual stuff is more important as the quant … but no one wants to make losses.

        • Nick says:
          8 Jun8 June 13:50

          Hi TGL! I accept some of your comments. I’ve been travelling internationally, on business, for well over 40 years now. OK, maybe nothing special, but I often see, a complete ignorance, from airline & hotel designers, of anything remotely in touch with reality, for the traveller. Without going into it too much, it’s all now, increasingly, about form over function! I get fed up with the number of hotels, often in large groups, that don’t even have somewhere to hang your washbag. The washbasin is so large, and the lighting so poor, that you can’t even see what you’re doing when shaving in the morning.

          I’ll continue to post my views, but, the point I’m attempting to raise, is that, increasingly, IMHO, the people that sign off on these issues, probably have little, or no experience of what international travel actually involves.

          I apologise for the rant, but it’s something I feel strongly about.

          • TGLoyalty says:
            8 Jun8 June 14:08

            Which isn’t the accountants … it’s the CEOs the COOs, the Cheif experience officers, the heads of lounges etc etc

          • AJA says:
            8 Jun8 June 14:10

            Retired accountant here. The reality is that too many businesses see the finance department as a barrier to business and blame finance when things go wrong or budgets are imposed.

            The fact is that there are some actions such as blocking further sales to delinquent customers that can be seen as obstructive but as I had to point out too many times a sale is not a sale until it has been paid for.

            Also the finance department does things that keep the business going. It is not glamorous and is usually not seen as being a business partner but it is as vital as having laptops and computers and mobile phones. Any business that treats finance as the poor relation does not do well in the long term.

            These seat designs were not imposed by the finance department, any more than finance had a say in their design, but you can bet they did have an input into the budgeting and cost control necessary for a successful implementation of them on board aircraft.

            I agree that bad design is often done because the person or teams doing the design have not had to try it out as a customer. It even comes down to things like those bottles of shampoo and shower gel that have such tiny writing on them that unless you have 20 20 vision are almost impossible to read. And no one thinks about the cleaner who has to struggle to refill the bottles stuck to the wall.

            Cost cutting done for the sake of cost cutting is setting you up to fail. But things done properly can be transformative.

          • Nick says:
            8 Jun8 June 14:40

            Well, I give up TGL, because you appear to be stuck in the same groove, unable to even accept my views, even accepting some of yours! But, if you wish to keep banging on about accountants, which, BTW, the main thrust of my original post was not about at all. accountants anyway, even remotely! You maybe missed the thrust of my original post, about musculoskeletal issues, but where I also clearly stated “I sometimes despair at the designers here and/or the penny pinching accountants”, but maybe you missed that “and/or” comment. Let’s just agree to disagree!

          • Nick says:
            8 Jun8 June 14:58

            Thanks AJA for your measured & accurate comments, which I clearly largely agree with too, based on my OP.

          • TGLoyalty says:
            8 Jun8 June 21:48

            @Nick .. it’s was just a suggestion of where to lay blame next time you make you and/or comment. Accountants don’t make the decisions alone they purely guide on the financial impact of decisions.

          • Bagoly says:
            9 Jun9 June 11:35

            @AJA has it spot on: “I agree that bad design is often done because the person or teams doing the design have not had to try it out as a customer.”

            This is something that senior executives can easily fix – just add a standard requirement that any design has had a mock-up slept-in for a night, sat in on the ground for a day of work, etc by both each member of the team proposing it, and other unrelated people with relevant diversity (age and gender, but also things like height, sight quality and does wet shaving)

  • Gordon says:
    8 Jun8 June 06:27

    Glad I am flying on an A350-900 MAD-BOG Christmas, which has the new business suite, tbh The suite on the A350 looks better. Looking forward to your review of it, once it’s fitted Rhys.

    Good news regarding the projected range of the A321XLR, can’t have enough carriers for redemption flights to SEA.

    • JDB says:
      8 Jun8 June 06:41

      @Gordon just be aware that although it’s supposed to be the new suite with door on routes such as BOG, it’s far from guaranteed and you won’t get any aircraft change notification as only the cabin style changes which affects I think maybe only one seat. The older version without a door is still excellent.

      • Gordon says:
        8 Jun8 June 06:46

        Yes, I’ll keep my fingers crossed.

      • zapato1060 says:
        8 Jun8 June 12:06

        Agree @JDB. We got A350 old MAD-BOG but BOG-MAD new style. Great flying.

  • Steven Pilkington says:
    8 Jun8 June 06:43

    I have to appreciate the Tangled reference 😄

  • Stuart says:
    8 Jun8 June 07:05

    A321XLR pilot/crew familiarisation flights MAD-LHR-MAD ?
    A little day trip will be taken if so – fingers crossed !!

  • Jonathon says:
    8 Jun8 June 07:40

    10-11 hours on a narrow body in economy sounds awful. I’m assuming economy seats at least have decent pitch for these long journeys.

  • Steph says:
    8 Jun8 June 07:52

    Has anyone been successful in getting 4 Avios J seats? I was able to book them in the past but now they only release 2 Avios seats in business.

    • Michael C says:
      8 Jun8 June 08:53

      I think there’s the occasional random “dump” (certainly on GRU-,MAD), but it’s very much the exception.

      • Steph says:
        8 Jun8 June 09:03

        When does this “occasional” happen?

        • JDB says:
          8 Jun8 June 09:50

          There’s no rationale as to the timing, but it is quite a bit more than occasional. Also, you will usually find additional long haul business seats as part of married segments from Spanish domestic or nearby international airports.

          • Steph says:
            8 Jun8 June 10:32

            I see. What if MAD is the destination rather than starting point? How can married segments work in this scenario? I.e. BUE-MAD

          • JDB says:
            8 Jun8 June 10:42

            @Steph – no if you start your journey in some Spanish cities outside Madrid and fly back to the same or another domestic city, you will usually find a fair bit of extra availability.

          • Steph says:
            8 Jun8 June 12:13

            Hmm tried that just now. No luck

  • TGLoyalty says:
    8 Jun8 June 08:58

    BA getting any of these LR or XLRs? Or even proper business class seats on a standard A321 for on mid haul routes

    • Rhys says:
      8 Jun8 June 09:00

      Nope. Not worth it when Heathrow is so congested I imagine.

      • TGLoyalty says:
        8 Jun8 June 10:44

        Gatwick, Manchester, EDI aren’t though … just saying. It’s not Heathrow Airways 🙂

        And they aren’t flying A32x to mid haul destinations anyway so it’s not changing anything from a congestion perspective.

        • Bernard says:
          8 Jun8 June 15:11

          Regional yields don’t support BA.
          They the regions to JFK on 757s years ago. It didn’t work with their cost base.
          Aer Lingus UK fly the 321LR from Manchester.

          • TGLoyalty says:
            8 Jun8 June 21:49

            The whole point in these aircraft is to bring down the cost base …

        • Bagoly says:
          9 Jun9 June 11:29

          But it is London Airways ! 🙂

    • Rob says:
      8 Jun8 June 09:19

      No

    • Richie says:
      8 Jun8 June 09:20

      AA are. It’ll be interesting to see where they’ll fly them to.

  • r* says:
    8 Jun8 June 09:03

    That seat width looks quite small?

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