My Aer Lingus A321neo LR flight in AerSpace (a business class seat without business class service) from Dublin to London was short, but gave me enough time to evaluate the seat and its features that you can except on a transatlantic Aer Lingus A321 flight.
Aer Lingus A321neo AerSpace (LHR-DUB)
Although it is not a Star Alliance carrier, Aer Lingus uses Terminal 2 at LHR. AerSpace has a dedicated check-in line. After a check-in snafu concerning my class of service, I quickly cleared security.
I used the Aer Lingus Lounge for about 30 minutes before the flight. With a nice English breakfast and a barista-made coffee, it’s now one of my favorites in T2.
My boarding pass indicated that boarding would begin 30 minutes prior to departure, but when I showed up 35 minutes prior to departure, boarding was mostly complete. In fact, I was the last passenger onboard…
Aer Lingus 155
London (LHR) – Dublin (DUB)
Thursday, November 6
Depart: 9:50 AM
Arrive: 11:15 AM
Duration: 1hr, 25min
Aircraft: Airbus A321neo LR
Distance: 280 miles
Seat: 5K (AerSpace – “Business Class”)
Stepping onto the aircraft, I found only one other person seated in the business class cabin, which is marketed as AerSpace on flights across the Irish Sea and within Europe. I have no idea why Aer Lingus does not sell a “real” business class, but maybe it gets its inspiration from Our Lady Air?
A flight attendant warmly greeted me. No pre-departure beverage, but we soon pushed back…it would be a quick flight to Dublin.
Seat
I was seated in 5K, a throne seat (the other passenger was in 3K). The A321neo has 16 seats in business class: a very classic Thompson Aero Vantage seat. You’ll see these seats on the SAS A321LR as well and on JetBlue’s older A321s.
Here’s some more I took after landing:
> Read More: SAS A321LR Business Class Review
> Read More: JetBlue A321 Mint Business Class Review
If you can score a throne seat, you can count on excellent space and comfort, plus extra storage via a cabinet and at knee level on the side.
If you wind up in an even-numbered row, you will have a seatmate and window seat passengers will not have direct aisle access. All seats are 22 inches wide.
The seat reclines into a 77-inch 180º lie-flat bed, though of course there was no need to sleep on a 9:50 am flight that was only 45 minutes long.
Seat controls include a massage function.
Each seat has a universal A/C, USB-A, and USB-C outlet.
There are individual air vents above each seat.
IFE + Wi-Fi
The full in-flight entertainment library was available, but no headphones were offered (though I did not ask for any). Selections included a special section of Irish films and audio (always appreciated on a nation’s flag carrier), plus other music, TV shows, games, and movies.
Wi-Fi internet was available too, at a cost of :
- €2.49 – messaging
- €5.99 – streaming
It was such a short flight that I did not connect. While Aer Lingus offers its business class passengers free Wi-Fi, since this technically was not business class, there was no free Wi-Fi.
The weather was bad departing London, but it was a beautiful, sunny day in Dublin:
Food + Drink
In AerSpace, there is no meal service in the traditional sense…certainly nothing plated like on a Aer Lingus longhaul flight or intra-Europe business on another carrier. Instead, you can have one food item and one drink from the Bia menu (Bia, pronounced Bee-ah, is Irish for “food”).
I was hoping to order the Irish Breakfast, which his a mainstay on the buy-on-board menu, but was told there were none loaded. Instead, I had a “Festive Turkey, Cranberry, Ham, & Cheese Toastie” which was not very sightly, but tasted decent. I had a bottle of sparkling water with it.
Lavatory
The A321neo has a lavatory in the front of the aircraft for business class passengers that featured mood lighting just like the cabin.
Unlike some other A321neo operators, there is not a lavatory behind the front cabin that is used by both business class and economy class passengers.
Service
The service was excellent oaths flight. A single flight attendant took care of me and the other passenger and she was very kind and attentive, despite having little to work with in terms of service.
She was from Portugal…I’m not attune to the labor issues that Aer Lingus may be experiencing, but it was the first time I’ve ever had a non-Irish FA when fly Aer Lingus.
CONCLUSION
We landed on-time in Dublin, where I found a very chaotic terminal under construction. This was a very pleasant flight and an aircraft I would not hesitate to fly transatlantic in.
I used miles for my ticket, but sometimes the upgrade from economy to AerSpace is well worth the premium if you are traveling with luggage.
I just don’t understand Aer Lingus. Surely there’s demand to DUB for a proper business class, and I also don’t know why they’re not in oneworld. None of it makes sense.
The lack of oneworld membership makes no sense to me!
Thank you for bravely putting yourself at risk to sample the food options and report back to us on whether you survived 🙂
That was back in November when I was still eating toxic stuff. I’m still eating a lot of airline food, but not stuff like that any longer.
Let’s add that, as of today, EI has 14 A321neos in its fleet with an average age of 3.6 years.
Seems like a pretty satisfying Lingus…