American Airlines 787-9 With Flagship Business Suites: Routes + Award Space
American Airlines is finally ready to roll out its new Flagship Business Suites aboard the Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner, its first major business class hard product update in decade. The new seats come with sliding privacy doors, wireless charging, more personal storage, and a chaise-style lounge seat with an adjustable headrest. The jury it out on these seats, but they look great to me…yet I’ll reserve final judgement until I actaully experince the seat.
The launch is set for June 5, 2025, with a domestic hop from Chicago O’Hare (ORD) to Los Angeles (LAX), followed by the international continuation to London Heathrow (LHR). After that, the new 787-9s will gradually be assigned to more long-haul routes, with the following schedule confirmed so far:
- June 5, 2025: Chicago (ORD) – London (LHR) on AA98/91
- Starting July 6, 2025, AA86/87 and AA 46/47 will also get Flagship Business Suites
- August 6, 2025: Philadelphia (PHL) – London (LHR) on AA728/737
- September 3, 2025: Philadelphia (PHL) – Zurich (ZRH) on AA92/93
- October 26, 2025: Dallas Fort Worth (DFW) – Brisbane (BNE) on AA7/8
The new aircraft will aso run daily between Chicago and Los Angeles on AA2012/2321.
If you’re booking or checking seat maps, these jets (the first two have registration code registration codes N845MD and N846AN) are labeled as the “78P” variant. They’ll feature 51 Flagship Business Suites, up from 30 in the older configuration, with a layout based on the Adient Ascent platform—an increasingly popular seat shell used by carriers like Hawaiian Airlines and Qatar Airways.
These new jets are part of American’s broader effort to increase the number of premium seats in its fleet by 50% by the end of the decade. The 787-9 will lead the way, but retrofits are also planned for the 777-300ER fleet and future A321XLR deliveries.
AA promises premium treatment on the ground and in the air for Flagship Business passengers: Flagship lounge access, multi-course dining, amenity kits, and upgraded bedding. For award travelers, these flights are already loaded into the system, with some dates bookable from 55,000 Alaska Mileage Plan miles one-way and also avaiable for as little as 62K American Airlines AAdvantage miles one-way.
CONCLUSION
AA will shortly introduce its Flagship Business Suites aboard the Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner, with flights beginning Jun 5, 2025. I do not plan on being on the inaugural flight, but I do hope to try this product in the near future.
The new 787-9s with Flagship Suites look promising—and finally give American something to show off on the international stage. Now let’s just hope AA gets the soft product right too…
images: American Airlines
Any idea when the seat maps will be updated? I have a ticket to Zurich later this year to visit family but the seat map still shows the old configuration.
I suspect AA will update seat maps only when they have high confidence the 78P variant will be used on a flight. For example, if you look at August 8, 2025, AA’s two non-stops from PHL to LHR clearly show which is a 789 with reverse herringbone Collins Aerospace Super Diamond business class seats (flight AA736) and which one is operated by the new 78P (flight AA728). This seems consistent through Saturday October 25, 2025, which is the first day AA goes from two daily direct flights on the PHL to LHR route to one per day (AA728). On Sunday, October 26, 2025, the aircraft type and seat map shows the regular 789 aircraft without the new Flagship Business Suites operating flight AA728. If I would have to bet, I’d say that with the limited number of 78P aircraft to deploy and the potential for Boeing delivery delays, AA will prioritize the 78P on the LHR routes out of ORD going forward on AA98 and AA46 to try and poach as many Chicago-based United customers (and AA hopes corporate accounts) as possible.
A sensible perspective. I’m traveling in November though so the new service to ZRH should presumably be written in stone for the only daily flight or AA wouldn’t have announced it now. American management have a lot of shortcomings but wanting to look stupid for publicly promising something that they weren’t sure about seems unlikely.
I just confirmed ORD-LHR in August with a SWU! Map is accurate, and itinerary reflects 78P.
@Matthew – PHL-ZRH only shows the 78P with the changed seat map until 23 October. Do you think they’re switching the plane to BNE for the service starting 26 October? It strikes me as odd to have an inaugural service that gets killed off after six weeks.