American Airlines 787-9 Flagship Suite Business Class Review: Chicago to London

American Airlines’ new Boeing 787-9 Flagship Suite represents a major upgrade over the airline’s previous long-haul Business Class products. We recently had the chance to fly the new cabin from Chicago O’Hare to London Heathrow, and even better, we were seated in the more spacious Flagship Suite Preferred seats.

The new product looks impressive from the moment you step onboard. Every Business Class passenger gets direct aisle access, a sliding privacy door, a modern entertainment system and a fully flat bed. The eight Flagship Suite Preferred bulkhead seats go even further, offering considerably more personal space, additional storage, upgraded bedding and enhanced amenities.

During the day, we absolutely loved the seat. In fact, we preferred the American Airlines Flagship Suite Preferred to the British Airways Club Suite for sitting, working and relaxing.

Sleeping was a different story.

In this review, we cover the complete experience from the Flagship Lounge in Chicago to boarding, the new American Airlines 787-9 Business Class seat, the differences between the standard and Preferred suites, storage, entertainment, amenities, food, service and how comfortable the seat really is for sleeping.

If you are specifically looking for the new cabin, see our regularly updated guide to American Airlines Flagship Suite routes.

Before departure, we visited the American Airlines Flagship Lounge at Chicago O’Hare, which we already reviewed several years ago.

The lounge was noticeably more crowded this time, although we still managed to find three free seats together. Despite the crowds, our opinion of the lounge itself has not really changed. It remains an excellent lounge and the food selection was good enough that we had already eaten quite well before boarding.

That was particularly useful because Chicago to London is a relatively short overnight flight, where every extra hour of sleep matters.

Boarding Experience

Boarding in Chicago was well organized and the individual boarding groups were handled efficiently.

The main problem was the gate itself. The area simply felt too small for the number of passengers waiting to board a full widebody aircraft. People were standing around the gate and blocking parts of the surrounding area, making everything look more chaotic than the boarding process actually was.

Once boarding started, however, everything moved smoothly and we were quickly onboard.

Flight Information

• Airline: American Airlines
• Aircraft: Boeing 787-9P Dreamliner
• Route: Chicago O’Hare (ORD) to London Heathrow (LHR)
• Cabin: Flagship Business Class
• Configuration: 1-2-1
• Business Class seats: 51
• Flagship Suite Preferred seats: 8
• Flight time: Approximately 7 hours

The premium-configured Boeing 787-9P has 51 Flagship Suites, all with direct aisle access and sliding privacy doors.

Eight of the 51 seats are designated Flagship Suite Preferred. These are the bulkhead suites at the front of the two Business Class sections, including four in the smaller Business Class mini-cabin.

Because of the staggered numbering, they are not all literally in row 1. For example, the first middle pair in the forward cabin is numbered in row 2 even though those seats are physically at the front of the cabin.

You can find the current aircraft assignments and routes in our American Airlines Flagship Suite routes guide.

American Airlines Boeing 787-9 Business Class Seat

The first impression of American’s new Flagship Suite cabin is excellent.

The design feels modern without being overly flashy, and the combination of high seat walls, direct aisle access and a sliding privacy door gives every passenger a genuinely private space.

The standard Flagship Suite itself is already a substantial improvement over American Airlines’ previous long-haul Business Class seats.

Every seat has direct aisle access, a suite door and plenty of privacy.

Flagship Suite Preferred

However, the eight Preferred bulkhead seats are the ones to look for if you can get them.

The additional space is immediately obvious. The Preferred suites have a considerably larger open area around the passenger, a more generous footwell, and huge surfaces in front and beside the seat.

During a daytime flight, this is one of the better Business Class seats we have tried. There is enough room for a laptop, tablet, phone, drinks and several other items without the suite ever feeling cluttered. The whole suite simply feels enormous while you are sitting in it.

Privacy and Seats for Couples

The middle Preferred seats are also excellent for couples travelling together.

A large divider separates the two suites. Leave it open and it is easy to talk to the person beside you. Raise it and both passengers have considerably more privacy.

Combined with the individual sliding suite doors, the privacy is excellent for Business Class.

Excellent Seat, But a Surprisingly Restrictive Bed

While sitting, relaxing or working, we actually preferred the American Airlines Flagship Suite Preferred to the British Airways Club Suite.

The American suite simply feels much larger.

Interestingly, that advantage did not carry over once it was time to sleep.

The published bed length is around 78 inches, which on paper should easily be enough for someone of my height. I am 1.86 metres tall, yet in practice I found the sleeping position more restrictive than expected.

The problem is that the headline length does not tell the complete story. The sleeping surface is not equally wide along its entire length. Space becomes more restricted both around the footwell and around the upper part of the bed near your head and shoulders.

As a result, the usable sleeping area felt noticeably tighter than the overall dimensions of the suite suggest.

On paper, 78 inches should have been more than enough. In practice, it simply did not feel that way.

Interestingly, the British Airways Club Suite looks smaller overall, yet we found it more comfortable for sleeping. American’s Preferred suite provides considerably more living space while sitting, but that additional space does not translate into an equally spacious sleeping surface.

For a daytime flight, we would choose the American Airlines Flagship Suite Preferred.

For an overnight flight, we still prefer the British Airways Club Suite for sleeping.

Seat Storage, Power Outlets and Entertainment

Storage is one of the strongest features of the Preferred seat.

There are open compartments, large shelves and plenty of usable surfaces. Even shoes can be stored underneath, while chargers, glasses and other personal items can remain easily accessible.

The regular Flagship Suite is not bad in this respect, but storage is considerably more limited.

Power and connectivity are excellent. The seats provide a universal power outlet, USB connections and wireless charging for compatible devices.

Entertainment

The new entertainment system worked very well throughout our flight.

The Flagship Suite features a large 17.5-inch 4K screen with a sharp picture and responsive interface. Bluetooth connectivity also allows passengers to connect compatible personal headphones.

The movie selection was good and certainly sufficient for a seven-hour flight, although we have seen a somewhat stronger selection on British Airways.

American Airlines also provides Bang & Olufsen headphones, and we found them very good. They were comfortable, sounded good and provided effective isolation from normal cabin noise.

Another smaller feature that deserves credit is the presence of individual overhead air vents. Many modern widebody Business Class cabins no longer provide personal air nozzles, so being able to control the airflow around the seat is something we appreciate.

Amenities

The amenity experience is another area where the Flagship Suite Preferred differs from the standard seat.

Passengers in the regular Flagship Suites received an American Airlines and U.S. Soccer-themed transparent amenity kit on our flight.

The Preferred amenity kit was substantially better.

Our Preferred seats came with a large red leather-style amenity bag that looked and felt significantly more premium than the regular Business Class kit. It is something that can genuinely be reused after the flight rather than feeling like disposable airline packaging.

More importantly, the upgraded kit is not just about the bag itself. Flagship Suite Preferred passengers receive the same higher-tier amenity-kit offering American uses for its long-haul Flagship First passengers.

Our kit included a selection of Joanna Vargas skincare products, including a face mask and eye patches, together with additional skincare items, earplugs, tissues, mouthwash, a dental kit, comb and other travel essentials.

It is noticeably more complete and more premium than the standard Flagship Suite kit.

Preferred passengers also receive upgraded bedding, including a more substantial mattress pad.

Considering that only eight seats on the entire aircraft receive these extras, the Preferred suites are genuinely different from the rest of the Business Class cabin.

Food and Drinks

The dinner menu offered four main-course choices, which we would consider a normal and competitive selection for long-haul Business Class. It is not unusually extensive, but it is broadly similar to what most major airlines offer.

The meal started with a small plate and salad. The main-course options were:

• All Day Roast – rustic potatoes, peas, turnips and carrots with apple cider demi sauce
• Seared Atlantic Salmon – roasted garlic mashed potatoes, roasted asparagus and cherry tomatoes with caper dill cream sauce
• Tamarind Glazed Chicken – coconut rice, sautéed bok choy and carrots with tamarind reduction
• Vegetarian Lasagna – roasted cauliflower and mushrooms with homemade tomato sauce

Dessert choices included a traditional ice cream sundae, a gourmet cheese plate and pineapple upside-down cake.

American also offered an express meal for passengers who wanted to eat quickly and maximize their sleeping time, which is a useful option on a relatively short eastbound overnight flight.

As we had already eaten well in the Flagship Lounge, we were not particularly hungry. Nevertheless, I wanted to try one of the main courses and ordered the Seared Atlantic Salmon.

Unfortunately, I completely forgot to take a photo of it.

In this particular case, you are not missing a beautifully presented Business Class dish. The presentation was fairly basic, the salmon was dry and it simply did not taste particularly good.

We have had considerably better salmon on other airlines.

The description on the menu definitely sounded better than the meal tasted.

Based on this flight, catering was one of the weaker parts of the experience.

Drinks and Wine

The drinks selection was broadly what we would expect from a major long-haul Business Class product.

Spirits included Bacardi rum, Aviation Gin, Tito’s vodka and Socorro Tequila, while the whisky selection included Dewar’s, Jack Daniel’s, Woodford Reserve and The Glenlivet 12 Year Old.

There was also beer, non-alcoholic beer, soft drinks, juices, Lavazza coffee and tea.

The wine list was more interesting.

Champagne Bollinger Special Cuvée was offered alongside Taub Chardonnay, Yealands Sauvignon Blanc, Decoy Cabernet Sauvignon and Salentein Reserve Malbec, with Maynard’s Fine Tawny Port available as dessert wine.

That is a perfectly respectable wine selection and probably one of the stronger elements of the catering.

Breakfast

Before arrival, passengers could choose between an American breakfast with scrambled eggs, Canadian bacon, roasted potatoes and tomato, or a lighter fresh fruit bowl with Greek yogurt and granola.

Given the relatively short overnight flight, our priority by that stage was getting whatever sleep we could rather than eating another meal.

Service

The flight attendants were friendly throughout the flight, and our interactions with them were pleasant.

However, friendly and efficient are not necessarily the same thing.

On an eastbound transatlantic flight of only around seven hours, speed matters. One of the main reasons passengers pay for Business Class is to eat reasonably quickly, convert the seat into a bed and maximize the relatively short sleeping window.

On our flight, it took roughly three hours before the main service was effectively finished and the cabin settled down.

That is simply too long for this type of overnight flight.

Unfortunately, even once the meal service had ended, sleeping remained difficult. Crew members were talking fairly loudly in the galley during parts of the night and there was additional noise coming from that area.

This is also one possible disadvantage of some of the Preferred bulkhead positions: their location gives them considerably more space, but proximity to the galley can also mean more noise.

Combined with the restrictive bed geometry, I managed only around two hours of sleep.

Cabin Cleaning Could Be Better

The aircraft itself looked very new and my own seat appeared clean when we boarded.

Unfortunately, the same could not be said for every seat.

There was a sock lying on the floor at my wife’s seat, presumably left by the passenger on the previous flight. Her table was also sticky, apparently after someone had spilled a drink.

Neither issue is dramatic, but both should have been noticed during cabin cleaning before boarding, particularly in an international premium cabin on such a new aircraft.

Is American Airlines 787-9 Business Class Worth It?

Yes, absolutely.

American Airlines has created an excellent new Business Class hard product with the 787-9 Flagship Suite.

The standard suite already offers everything we expect from a modern premium seat: direct aisle access, a privacy door, a large entertainment screen, modern charging options and a fully flat bed.

The eight Flagship Suite Preferred seats go considerably further. They provide substantially more personal space, much more storage, a larger and more open footwell, upgraded bedding and the same higher-tier amenity kit offering used for American’s Flagship First passengers.

And there is another aspect of American’s approach that we particularly like.

At the time of our flight, the Flagship Suite Preferred seats could be selected without an additional seat fee.

That is how we think a premium Business Class cabin should work.

Of course, we could understand American eventually charging a reasonable supplement for these eight seats. They genuinely provide something extra: more space, better bedding and enhanced amenities.

What we would not like to see is the much more complicated approach taken with Lufthansa Allegris.

Lufthansa’s new Allegris Business Class contains numerous different seat categories with different characteristics and potentially substantial additional seat-selection charges. In comparison, American keeps things refreshingly simple: the vast majority of the cabin consists of the same excellent Flagship Suite, while only eight seats are enhanced Preferred versions.

Even if American eventually charges a sensible premium for those eight seats, we would consider that much easier to understand than turning a Business Class cabin into a collection of differently priced seat types.

Compared directly with Lufthansa Allegris, we preferred the overall space and simplicity of American’s Flagship Suite Preferred. Lufthansa did have one clear advantage based on our recent experience: the food was better.

The comparison with British Airways is more nuanced.

For a daytime flight, we would choose the American Airlines Flagship Suite Preferred over the British Airways Club Suite. The American seat simply offers more space for sitting, working and relaxing.

For sleeping, however, British Airways still wins for us. Despite looking smaller, the Club Suite provided a more comfortable sleeping position.

Final Verdict

American Airlines’ new Flagship Suite is a major improvement and one of the better Business Class products currently available across the Atlantic.

The Flagship Suite Preferred is particularly impressive. The sheer amount of personal space, excellent storage, privacy door, large 4K entertainment screen, Bang & Olufsen headphones, upgraded bedding and First Class-level amenity kit make these eight seats genuinely special.

During the day, we would happily choose the Preferred suite over British Airways Club Suite.

The biggest surprise was sleeping comfort. Despite the published bed length of around 78 inches and the enormous overall suite, the sleeping surface narrows around both the feet and the upper part of the body. At 1.86 metres, I found it more restrictive than expected and ultimately found the British Airways Club Suite more comfortable for sleeping.

The slow dinner service made matters worse. Taking around three hours to complete the service on a seven-hour overnight flight leaves passengers with very little time to make use of the flat bed. Noise from the galley further reduced our sleep.

The dry salmon and inconsistent cabin cleaning were additional negatives, although neither would prevent us from booking American again.

The most important point is that most of our criticism concerns the execution of this particular flight rather than the new seat itself.

The Flagship Suite is an excellent Business Class product, and we would definitely book it again.

If available, we would choose one of the eight Flagship Suite Preferred seats again as well, especially while American continues to allow them to be selected without an additional fee.

To see which flights currently offer the new cabin, visit our regularly updated American Airlines Flagship Suite routes and aircraft guide.