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Airlines are installing new luxury seats
Airlines are installing new luxury seats, but no one is allowed to sit in them
Airlines are installing new luxury seats, but no one is allowed to sit in them
Lie-flat seats in private pods face long waits for safety certifications, delaying debuts for carriers’ high-end offerings.
Published on: Jun 28, 2026 4:10 PM IST WSJ Prefer HTon Google Share via Copy link Dutch airline KLM has been preparing for a new and more-luxe business-class experience, featuring 34 lie-flat seats equipped with privacy doors and 19-inch touch screens. Airlines such as Lufthansa are rolling out luxurious seats and pods to fly passengers in comfort and style. But there’s a problem. The seats, which the carrier is marketing to high-end fliers on a brand new long-haul jet, haven’t yet been certified by aviation authorities. So when it launches its inaugural flight featuring the seats in September, they will be empty. Lufthansa has had a similar problem. So does Singapore Airlines. A number of carriers, including United and American, have debuted new business-class suites with their doors locked open, awaiting approval. Airlines are in an amenities arms race to stand apart and fly passengers in comfort and style. Seats are at the forefront, with private pods kitted out with extra storage space, wireless charging, ottomans and retractable privacy dividers. U.S. and European aviation safety authorities are saying not so fast. Seats are often the last things installed on a new plane. In some cases, the lengthy process left plane makers with jets they can’t yet deliver to airlines. “We have airplanes sitting for customers, completely done, waiting for seat certifications,” Boeing Chief Executive Kelly Ortberg said last month. Kelly Ortberg, CEO of Boeing. Everything from seat-belt buckle mechanisms to door latches could change how passengers might evacuate in an emergency, or how they are protected in a crash, Federal Aviation Administration chief Bryan Bedford told reporters last month. “You don’t usually think of seats as novel technology,” Bedford said. “We see seats, suites, especially in the premium section of the airplane, that just don’t pass our human factors tests for impact.” The testing isn’t new. But more complex, customized seat designs and new materials are raising new questions for regulators, said Gary Weissel, a consultant who has assisted airlines in developing, certifying and installing new interiors. When seats are installed at an angle, like the herringbone configuration airlines have used to fit more flatbed seats, passengers can experience different types of injuries in a crash, compared with the forward-facing seats that have populated coach cabins for decades. Roomier pods and other spacious premium seats allow bodies to go flailing in unusual ways. “Even when we’re changing the placement of the passenger a little bit, even when we’re changing the material to be sleeker looking, we still need to make sure that it meets all of those critical criteria,” said Caitlin Locke, the FAA’s safety chief. Cabin safety improvements are one reason that passengers can walk away from accidents today that would have been fatal decades ago, Locke said at a conference this month.Crash tests and dummies
New seats are run through a gantlet of tests to prove that they’re safe for passengers. They are mounted on sleds and fired down a track to make sure they remain structurally sound when subjected to 16 times the force of gravity. Crash dummies are evaluated for injuries. New lightweight materials must pass flame tests to make sure they won’t ignite and spread fire throughout a cabin. Coming up with fixes can be time consuming, and delays are costing airlines. When Lufthansa’s new Boeing 787-9 Dreamliners started flying last year, only four of the 28 business-class seats were available to book, with the rest blocked off. It flew that way until mid-March, after the FAA approved most of them—though three seats in the second row are still blocked. That set back Lufthansa’s plan to upsell customers on five different seating options within its business-class cabins on the Dreamliner. Lufthansa displayed some of its planned premium offerings last year. Singapore Airlines has pushed back the launch of its first retrofitted Airbus A350-900 long-haul plane to early next year, citing delays in certification of one of the seats, along with industrywide supply-chain constraints. Even though Air France, KLM’s sister airline, has business-class seats similar to those KLM installed on its Airbus A350, a spokesperson for the European Union Aviation Safety Agency said KLM’s new business-class design includes more rows and different angles. That requires additional safety testing. Delta Air Lines had new Airbus A321neo planes in storage waiting for new lie-flat seats to be approved. But certification could stretch into 2028, and Delta is weighing whether to go with another supplier. Meanwhile, Delta temporarily installed 44 of its less-luxe first-class recliners on seven of those planes for cross-country flights. Safran, the manufacturer of Delta’s new lie-flat seats, said certification—especially for business-class seats—has become more complex over the years, given new designs and features as well as technology that enables better understanding of passenger safety. The company said it is working with Delta to address the latest requirements.Seat selection
The FAA said it is working with the industry to communicate and catch issues earlier in the development process, and avoid pitfalls. Riyadh Air in early 2023 placed an order for a fleet of Boeing long-haul jets, aiming to challenge the dominance of rivals in the United Arab Emirates and Qatar while supercharging Saudi Arabia’s connectivity. It targeted the first half of 2025 for its first commercial flights, giving the carrier two years to get its new cabin and seats certified. That proved too tight a deadline. Riyadh Air was able to get over the finish line a year behind schedule with tweaks to its seat design. It was a relative victory compared with the yearslong battles competitors are still fighting to get theirs flying. “I could write a Ph.D. on this subject, believe me,” said Tony Douglas, Riyadh Air’s CEO, in an interview earlier this month, shortly after the airline’s first commercial flight landed at London Heathrow airport. Write to Alison Sider at alison.sider@wsj.com and Benjamin Katz at ben.katz@wsj.com Get the latest headlines from US news and global updates from Pakistan, Nepal, UK, Bangladesh, Russia and US Iran war Live, get all the latest headlines in one place on Hindustan Times. Home/World News/Airlines Are Installing New Luxury Seats, But No One Is Allowed To Sit In Them See LessDutch airline KLM has been preparing for a new and more-luxe business-class experience, featuring 34 lie-flat seats equipped with privacy doors and 19-inch touch screens.
But there’s a problem. The seats, which the carrier is marketing to high-end fliers on a brand new long-haul jet, haven’t yet been certified by aviation authorities. So when it launches its inaugural flight featuring the seats in September, they will be empty.
Lufthansa has had a similar problem. So does Singapore Airlines. A number of carriers, including United and American, have debuted new business-class suites with their doors locked open, awaiting approval.
Airlines are in an amenities arms race to stand apart and fly passengers in comfort and style. Seats are at the forefront, with private pods kitted out with extra storage space, wireless charging, ottomans and retractable privacy dividers. U.S. and European aviation safety authorities are saying not so fast.
Seats are often the last things installed on a new plane. In some cases, the lengthy process left plane makers with jets they can’t yet deliver to airlines.
“We have airplanes sitting for customers, completely done, waiting for seat certifications,” Boeing Chief Executive Kelly Ortberg said last month.
Everything from seat-belt buckle mechanisms to door latches could change how passengers might evacuate in an emergency, or how they are protected in a crash, Federal Aviation Administration chief Bryan Bedford told reporters last month.
“You don’t usually think of seats as novel technology,” Bedford said. “We see seats, suites, especially in the premium section of the airplane, that just don’t pass our human factors tests for impact.”
The testing isn’t new. But more complex, customized seat designs and new materials are raising new questions for regulators, said Gary Weissel, a consultant who has assisted airlines in developing, certifying and installing new interiors.
When seats are installed at an angle, like the herringbone configuration airlines have used to fit more flatbed seats, passengers can experience different types of injuries in a crash, compared with the forward-facing seats that have populated coach cabins for decades. Roomier pods and other spacious premium seats allow bodies to go flailing in unusual ways.
“Even when we’re changing the placement of the passenger a little bit, even when we’re changing the material to be sleeker looking, we still need to make sure that it meets all of those critical criteria,” said Caitlin Locke, the FAA’s safety chief.
Cabin safety improvements are one reason that passengers can walk away from accidents today that would have been fatal decades ago, Locke said at a conference this month.
They are mounted on sleds and fired down a track to make sure they remain structurally sound when subjected to 16 times the force of gravity. Crash dummies are evaluated for injuries. New lightweight materials must pass flame tests to make sure they won’t ignite and spread fire throughout a cabin.
Coming up with fixes can be time consuming, and delays are costing airlines.
When Lufthansa’s new Boeing 787-9 Dreamliners started flying last year, only four of the 28 business-class seats were available to book, with the rest blocked off. It flew that way until mid-March, after the FAA approved most of them—though three seats in the second row are still blocked.
That set back Lufthansa’s plan to upsell customers on five different seating options within its business-class cabins on the Dreamliner.
Singapore Airlines has pushed back the launch of its first retrofitted Airbus A350-900 long-haul plane to early next year, citing delays in certification of one of the seats, along with industrywide supply-chain constraints.
Even though Air France, KLM’s sister airline, has business-class seats similar to those KLM installed on its Airbus A350, a spokesperson for the European Union Aviation Safety Agency said KLM’s new business-class design includes more rows and different angles. That requires additional safety testing.
Delta Air Lines had new Airbus A321neo planes in storage waiting for new lie-flat seats to be approved. But certification could stretch into 2028, and Delta is weighing whether to go with another supplier. Meanwhile, Delta temporarily installed 44 of its less-luxe first-class recliners on seven of those planes for cross-country flights.
Safran, the manufacturer of Delta’s new lie-flat seats, said certification—especially for business-class seats—has become more complex over the years, given new designs and features as well as technology that enables better understanding of passenger safety. The company said it is working with Delta to address the latest requirements.
Riyadh Air in early 2023 placed an order for a fleet of Boeing long-haul jets, aiming to challenge the dominance of rivals in the United Arab Emirates and Qatar while supercharging Saudi Arabia’s connectivity. It targeted the first half of 2025 for its first commercial flights, giving the carrier two years to get its new cabin and seats certified.
That proved too tight a deadline.
Riyadh Air was able to get over the finish line a year behind schedule with tweaks to its seat design. It was a relative victory compared with the yearslong battles competitors are still fighting to get theirs flying.
“I could write a Ph.D. on this subject, believe me,” said Tony Douglas, Riyadh Air’s CEO, in an interview earlier this month, shortly after the airline’s first commercial flight landed at London Heathrow airport.
Write to Alison Sider at alison.sider@wsj.com and Benjamin Katz at ben.katz@wsj.com
Source: HindustanTimes
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