Traveling to London in June - Airline Preference for Comfort

Regarding transatlantic flights I can only speak for Aer Lingus, which has pretty new planes and helpful flight attendants, and pretty comfortable seats and adequate leg room in coach -- in my opinion. I'm sure many airlines have upgrade options for better seats & a couple of inches more legroom, but I haven't experienced them.

You may find this website helpful if you are really serious about getting the best possible seating for your dollars https://www.seatguru.com/charts/longhaul_economy.php

Standard economy is most airlines is basically the same. If you can afford to upgrade to Economy Plus, Economy Comfort, etc. it is generally worth it. Of course, the only way to truly have some comfort is to up grade to business class. Now if you are below average in size than it might not make much difference. But for most of us that is not the case.

i like American Airlines. But how much money can you afford to spend? that is the reality.

Virgin Atlantic and British Airways are both quite comfortable from my experience. For the price, Norwegian is OK as well but not quite as good.

Also speaking only from one overseas experience, we found Aer Lingus decent. They fly Airbus 330s overseas. The seats were a bit more comfortable and the legroom was at least a bit better than your usual domestic economy flight. It wasn't horrible for a 7- or 8-hour flight, which I can't say for many 2-hour economy flights on American, United, etc.

We're flying Aer Lingus for a second time in May, so obviously we found it an acceptable combination of comfort and value.

As I was once told about housework -- "Ease, Elegance, Economy. Pick two"
Pick your tradeoff level between lower cost, greater comfort, shorter (non-stop) flights. For me, not having connecting flights is major. Extra legroom, not so much (I'm 5'4" and I sleep most of the way)

Lufthansa is one of our favorites -- good service, goes direct to where we want to go. And sometimes has sales.

We like Icelandair. Their economy is well priced and it is only a few hundred dollars to upgrade to Economy Comfort. That class still uses the three-across seating, but the center seat is replaced with a table. There also seems to be a bit more legroom. That class also includes a hot meal, drinks (including alcohol), some other items that are normally extra charge and the use of the airport lounge. There are no direct flights to anywhere because they all change in Reykjavik but that's not so bad as you have the use of the lounge. I also realized that, when you choose your seats, they sometimes include the last rows of business class. Our trip to Scotland has us in business class seats for economy comfort prices.

Are you talking economy class only?

The latest rankings from the industry regarded Skytrax Awards.
http://www.airlinequality.com/news/2016-world-airline-awards-announced/#mainMenu

World's Best Economy Class Airlines
1 Asiana Airlines
2 Qatar Airways
3 Singapore Airlines
4 Cathay Pacific
5 Emirates
6 Thai Airways
7 Turkish Airlines
8 Etihad Airways
9 ANA All Nippon Airways
10 Garuda Indonesia

For seat comfort ...
Best Economy Class Airline Seats
1 Asiana Airlines
2 Japan Airlines
3 Korean Air
4 Singapore Airlines
5 Thai Airways
6 Qatar Airways
7 ANA All Nippon Airways
8 Etihad Airways
9 Garuda Indonesia
10 EVA Air

For inflight food ...
Best Economy Class Airline Catering
1 Asiana Airlines
2 Thai Airways
3 Turkish Airlines
4 Singapore Airlines
5 Cathay Pacific
6 Etihad Airways
7 Garuda Indonesia
8 Qatar Airways
9 Emirates
10 Austrian

Unfortunately none of those airlines with get them from a US airport to London in an easy fashion. Turkish and Emirates would require a long flight via Istanbul or Dubai. Others would require them to fly west through Asia.

It would help to know where Laurie is starting from, but British Airways and Virgin Atlantic have direct flights to London from many US airports. Both those airlines have lots of fans, including in our family. British flies an A380 from some airports (LAX, SFO, MIA, YVR, and Chicago). These have some nice paired economy seats for couples (rather than 3 abreast) on the upper deck.

If the extra room is really important to you then consider a true premium economy ticket. It's a class of service between economy and business class. AFAIK only Virgin Atlantic and British Airways offers it. The US based airlines generally offer some seats with a little extra leg room.

http://www.virginatlantic.com/us/en/virgin-experience/cabins/premium-economy.html

We like Virgin's economy comfort, bigger seats than economy comfort on the U.S. airline we usually fly

I would also echo that upgrading to economy plus is a great idea for a relatively small increase compared to upgrading to business class. I routinely fly World Traveller Plus on British Airways, and it is like domestic business class. Much roomier seats, leg room and even better service.

Personally, I'd fly British Airways or Virgin Atlantic over an American airline (AA, United, Delta) to London, regardless. I think the service is much better.

David's link to the top 100 airlines list, rated by customers from best to worst, is interesting. I picked out the airlines familiar to me that fly US-Europe with their rating alongside.

Lufthansa (10)

Air France (14)

KLM (24)

British Air (26)

Virgin Atlantic (28)

Norwegian (30)

Air Canada (31)

Delta (35)

Aer Lingus (49)

United (68)

American (77)

Icelandair (81)

It's been awhile since I flew Premier Economy (or whatever they may call it now) on British Air but at that time you could have your carryon weigh twice as much as economy. Our first flight the boarding agent upgraded us to business class so that was great but on the way home the "premier" economy was fine.

Remember too that many airlines code share so you may not be on the plane you expect. We're flying BA to Paris soon and our flight home is a "British Air" flight but it's on an American Air plane.

I'd like to fly Virgin Atlantic next time so I looked on their website for r/t SFO-London on Feb 4, 2018... Economy was $624 and Economy Comfort was $1,978. Huge difference. I will consider flying VA in economy and pay the $140 extra for an exit row.

I see what you mean, Susan.

Out of curiosity, I compared your pricing on British Airways, and it's about the same difference on BA from SFO to LHR to go from Economy to Premium Economy. I was pretty shocked by this because it's never been that much for me (not even that much to go to Business class!). Usually it's just maybe $100-200 more, which is well worth it for me (as a fairly tall person). I fly out of Atlanta, so I checked that route for the same dates. It's only $150 more from Economy to Premium Economy on BA from ATL to LHR on the date you mentioned. I did a one week return on both searches. I also did a search for June 2017 - given the OP's time period being closer - and out of ATL to LHR, it's only about $200 more for the upgrade.

Long story short, it seems like the difference between economy and premium economy may partially be due to location and demand. Of note, I've also been upgraded to business class a fair number of times on my route, as someone else mentioned above.

Thanks Georgia for the good info. I was going to check BA as well but ran out of time today. So that explains it. I don't blame you for paying $100-200 more for the upgrade, I sure would, well worth it.

Sites like SeatGuru will show you the seat width and seat pitch on the aircraft planned for the flight. (Seat pitch isn't a measure of leg room, but it's close. It's a measure between any point on a seat and the same point on the next seat.) Airlines do occasionally need to switch aircraft and that, of course, can throw off seat assignments.

The economics of the industry drive every airline to put as many people on board each flight as possible. So in any given aircraft the cheap seats are going to be the most restrictive. Tall and thin folks might look for more seat pitch, while shorter and not-so-thin folks might look for more seat width.

I'm 6'3" and unless I buy an upgrade my knees invariably press into the back of the seat in front of me in economy. If that seat's occupant reclines more than a fraction of an inch, they intrude into my space.

Also, a few daytime (leaving in the morning) flights to London are available from some east coast airports. All others are typically overnight flights. If you think sleeping while scrunched up in an uncomfortable seat might be an issue, maybe check out a morning departure.

Definitely NOT United.

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/10/business/united-flight-passenger-dragged.html?_r=0

And the CEO blamed the passenger!!!

I included the link to airline ratings partly out of general interest, but also to highlight how poorly US and Canadian airlines fare in terms of service and comfort. I don't know how you guys in those 2 countries can endure such a poor product in economy over long haul journeys. Fortunately, I guess, trans Atlantic flights are only about 8-11 hours. In Australia we are lucky to have the quality Asian and ME carriers as options for the long 24+ hour trip to Europe.