Overall, I’ve really enjoyed my experiences flying in Virgin Atlantic’s upper class on the 787-9 Dreamliner between London and Los Angeles.
The airline’s answer to business class felt stylish and cool, just like the rest of the Virgin brand. My cabin has a sleek design complete with pink and purple lights and a social bar area — a great feature for groups.
I also found in-flight WiFi was affordable (about $30 USD) and reliable. However, a few small things have kept me from labeling its business class as my favorite.
Lunch included a delicious vegetarian meal of roasted red-pepper soup, a banh mi rice salad with teriyaki tofu, and rhubarb upside-down cake.
Later, I had vegetable gyozas and scones to snack on. The food was good, but a bit less plentiful than I might have liked for a flight of about 10 hours. I’d expected a second full meal on my long trip.
My least-favorite part of the experience was the seat itself. The 22-inch seat was reasonably comfortable but felt narrow, perhaps because of the design of its surrounding “walls.”
Plus, reclining it fully required standing up and using a manual effort to flip it into a lie-flat bed — far less convenient than and not as comfortable as other business-class seats I’ve had.
