Over the summer, I had the chance to fly Qantas’ A330 New Business. It is phenomenal, and well worth the miles to fly it!

Qantas announced that they would be installing the first seat with the ability to recline during take­off and landing. Of course I had to test it out in the various phases and seat settings.

For comparison, here is the seat in its upright and uncomfortable setting:

Here is the seat in its reclined for take-­off position:

I can testify that it is much, much more comfortable in the reclined position!

The seat in general also has a lot of other features, here’s the seat control:

Here is the seat reclined fully:

And if you’re curious of the kind of leg room you might have, this is from 1D:

There’s also In Flight Entertainment (IFE)… Here’s the controller.

Here’s the noise canceling headphones.

Here’s the screen – and there’s a lot of great options!

And if you want to get work done, the tray table is spacious, and provides plenty of room for a tablet, Surface, or laptop.

Of course if you want to eat, well, Qantas has some very good options for that as well

Conclusion:

I’m not one for hyperbole, but I wish every A330 was provisioned the way Qantas’ A330 is. The seat is very comfortable, I felt spoiled. The IFE was enjoyable. The food was good. But most important in any business class experience is the seat. It was perfect. I can’t say enough about the seat. Furthermore, with Qantas being an industry leader with the ability to be reclined at take-off and landing, well, that is huge. Absolutely huge. I highly recommend it.