Air France Business Class Review

What I liked

Reverse Herringbone seat was large and spacious
The bed was comfortable, and I was able to get some decent sleep
The food was good quality
Good alcohol selection, with good French Champagne
Service was top notch, with 3 attendants serving 16 business class passengers
Excellent Business lounges at CDG

What could be improved

Reverse Herringbone seat isn't ideal for couples and families
1 lavatory between 16 Business Class passengers!

The Business Class Cabin

I took an overnight flight from Guangzhou, China to CDG, Paris in Air France 777 Business Class. The flight length was 12h 50m, which gave me lots of time to enjoy the full range of services. The 777 flight has an intimate business cabin with 16 seats. There was no 1st class.

There was 1 lavatory between 16 passengers, which is clearly not enough!

The Seat

The business seat was a reverse Herringbone seat. This type of seat is one of the most popular business class seats. The Air France version has tons of space and privacy.

Each row had 4 seats. Everyone had direct aisle access. The window seats have your legs angled towards the window. The centre seats have your legs angled toward the centre.

While sleeping, your legs slot into a cubby hole at the front. The seat also has a separate storage compartment to hold your headphones.

The seat isn’t ideal for families. You’re a long way from neighbouring seats. I was travelling with my family. Myself and my daughter had seats in the centre aisle. She wasn’t able to reach my hand from her seat.

I found the bed to be very comfortable. I was able to get 7 hours of sleep. Pretty good for a plane! I arrived in Paris from my overnight flight, and didn’t feel like garbage!

The slideshow above has a few photos of the Air France Business Class Seat.

The In Flight Entertainment

The In Flight Entertainment screen was large, and the quality was crisp. In the above slideshow, you can see just how crisp the screen is. The screen pops out of the back of the seat in front. I was impressed by the image quality and the responsiveness of the remote control.

There was a large range of English, French and international movies and TV. As it was a night flight, I only watched one episode of Ballers before going to bed. I didn’t want to watch ballers, but I did want to have some information to put in this review! The headphones provided were perfectly acceptable for business class.

The Amenity Kit

My wife absolutely loved the amenity kit bags! As there were 3 of us travelling, we were able to get 3 bags of different colours – blue, red and green. I got the blue bag, although in reality she is now the proprietor of all 3 bags! The kit contained the following items:

Toothpaste
Toothbrush
Pen
Ear Plugs
Socks
Clarins Lip Balm
Clarins Moisturiser

The Food

The food was good. In the slideshow above, there’s photos of my food and the menu.

For dinner, there was a cold starter of scallops, chicken, roast vegetables and side salad. Cold food isn’t my thing, and this starter wasn’t very good. The dish had no flavour or seasoning. Just some olive oil. Salt and pepper was given on the side.

For the main, I had the duck. It was much better, although not amazing. There was a fair amount of sauce. It added lots of flavour to the dish. Without the sauce, the duck was pretty dry.

The presentation of the food wasn’t up to much. But it was 11pm – so who cares!

For breakfast I had the apple and banana crepes. I enjoyed the dish. However, I love pancakes – so I’m biased! These pancakes were very rich. I had a coffee with breakfast, which was bitter.

Overall, I enjoyed the food. The service was good and personal. Having 3 cabin staff for 16 passengers was appreciated.

The Drinks

I had a glass of champagne before take off. They served Deutz Brut Classic. It retails for about $60. I enjoyed the champagne. Although I only had 1 glass as I wanted to get some sleep.

The alcohol selection was pretty good for a business class flight. In the slideshow above, I show the drinks menu. You’ll see the wine list, spirits and beer on offer.

The Bourgogne Blanc white retails for $25. The other wines were of similar quality. This is pretty good. Cheap wine is an easy way for airlines to save money (I’m looking at you BA!). 95% of customers won’t know the difference.

The spirits offered were of the premium variety. The Glenlivet Founders Reserve retails for around $40.

Service

The service really was excellent. The cabin crew were experienced and seemed to genuinely enjoy providing a good service to customers. Once I woke up, the cabin crew were round in 2/3 minutes, to offer breakfast.

The crew were also very helpful to my daughter. They were very patient, and provided her with loads of toys and items to play with.

Conclusion

Air France have a top quality business class product, which has very few weaknesses. The seat, the service, the lounges and the food are all pretty good. They come highly recommended. There’s worse ways to travel in the sky!

I flew in Air France Short Haul Business Class. I was really impressed! The food was excellent, the champagne was on tap and the crew were friendly. The only disappointment was the seat, which is the same as economy.

One of Air France’s competitors is British Airways. I flew BA’s long haul business class. They call their seat the Club Suite. It’s a spacious seat, with a privacy door. The food was tasty and flavoursome. Not an easy feat in the sky!

Air France have a network of airline lounges. They’re pretty good too. Their Flagship Business Lounge in CDG, Paris is phenomenal. The lounge is huge, with champagne on tap. Myself and my wife also got complimentary spa treatments.

I recently stayed at the Intercontinental Paris Le Grand. It’s a large and imposing hotel next to the Paris Opera. The hotel has an excellent location and a beautiful design. Despite this, the hotel fell short in a couple of areas.

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