I had a lovely journey on Kenya Airways from Nairobi to New York in “Premier World” business class on the 787-8 and enjoyed gracious hospitality onboard that instantly made Kenya Airways my favorite African carrier.
Kenya Airways 787-8 Business Class Review
I booked this ticket using Air France Flying Blue miles from Johannesburg to New York via Jomo Kenyatta International Airport in Nairobi for 55,000 miles in business class, plus $458 in taxes/fees. Typically, the price is much higher, but this price popped up about three weeks prior to departure.
My journey began in Johannesburg, with a flight delay almost leading to a missed connection. Thankfully my flight was held for connecting passengers from Johannesburg and I soon settled into my seat for the 15 hour flight to New York JFK.
Kenya Airways (KQ) 002
Nairobi (NBO) – New York (JFK)
Saturday, July 23
Depart: 11:35 PM
Arrive: 07:35 AM+1
Duration: 15 hr, 00 min
Distance: 7,336 miles
Aircraft: Boeing 787-8
Seat: 3F (Business Class)
A flight attendant greeted me at the door, checked my boarding pass, and directed me through the galley and left to my seat in the front cabin.
Seating
Most other business class passengers had already boarded, though I was able to snap a few pictures prior to departure:
Kenya Airways 787-8 uses off-the-shelf Zodiac Aura Lite product for its business class seats. The front business class cabin has three rows of business class flat bed seats in a 2-2-2 configuration while the rear mini cabin has two rows, for a total of 30 seats.
People either love or hate these seats. I find there’s more to love than hate, considering your feet have unlimited legroom rather than being constrained by a box or cutout. On the other hand, they are not very private.
Each seat has 74 inches of seat pitch and is 31 inches wide.
In lie-flat mode, the bed is over six feet long and I slept well, despite the lack of air vents above each seat.
I like the personal storage in this seat, including a generous cutout for personal items (easily large enough for your larger electronic devices or small bags) as well as a literature pocket. Tray tables are in the center console and therefore do not restrict your knee room. While I greatly prefer a window seat, especially on a long haul flight (booking late, I again took the last seat in the cabin), I appreciated being able to get up and down without disturbing my seatmate.
Seat recline was electronically-controlled by push-button. The seat controls have a memory feature so you can set your favorite position and revert to it on demand.
Reading light:
Universal power outlet plus USB-A charger:
Bedding included a pillow and duvet with a soft velvety material on one side.
After we landed, I stayed behind a few moments to take additional pictures of the cabin:
Amenity Kit
A basic black, Kenya Airways-branded amenity kit was waiting on each seat. Contents included:
- toothbrush
- toothpaste
- earplugs
- comb
- eyeshade
- socks
- pen
Lavatory
With such a long flight time, I changed into my United Airlines pajamas (from the outbound flight) prior to pushback. I generally will not change into pajamas unless a flight is longer than 10 hours.
The lavatory was clean again still clean when I changed out of my pajamas prior to landing.
IFE + Wi-Fi
Kenya Airways does not offer wi-fi on its Dreamliner jets. If internet onboard is a concern, you will need to avoid Kenya Airways.
An IFE library included movies, TV shows, a moving map, and music. The selection was limited, with about 55 movies to choose from (far less than the 100 movies advertised), none which really caught my eye (I ended up watching Christopher Nolan’s Tenet for the fourth time – still one of my favorite movies that requires deep thought in order to figure out).
Some music and games were blocked:
Noise-cancelling headphones were a bit cumbersome over the ear, but functioned effectively.
With a great distance between the seat and the screen, the use of a remote was necessary to control the screen.
Food + Drink
A pre-departure beverage was offered, with a choice of water, orange juice, or sparkling wine.
Dinner was served after takeoff, followed by snacks on-demand, and breakfast before landing.
Dinner
Kenya Airways still had not brought back printed menus on my flight, forcing a flight attendant to walk through the cabin and read out options to each passenger. Main course choices included beef, chicken, or a vegetarian dish.
Service began with a hot towel.
I chose the “pan-seared chicken supreme served with spring onion rice, sautéed Kenyan beans, carrots, red pepper, and honey soya reduction.”
The entire meal was served on a single tray, with the main course and side dishes covered. For a 15-hour flight, the first meal was relatively skimpy. I had just eaten dinner on my connecting flight and was not all that hungry, but even United Airlines does better than bread, main course, and dessert. That said, the quality of the food was good, as was the presentation.
I stuck to water to drink, hoping to soon fall asleep.
With 13.5 hours left in the flight, I slept for the next nine hours…I am thankful to be able to sleep so well on flights.
Midnight Snack
I woke up with about four hours left in the flight. While I was not very hungry, I ordered a hamburger for purposes of this review from the “midnight snack” menu. It was served immediately in a red box.
Unwrapping it, I found a cheeseburger with BBQ sauce. I am fairly easy to please when it comes to hamburgers, but I thought it was pretty good.
For dessert, I had a small cup of cookies & cream ice cream.
Breakfast
Somehow I fell asleep again and woke up about two hours prior to landing, just as breakfast service was beginning. First came a hot towel.
Breakfast choices included chicken sausage, a mushroom omelet, or sautéed mushrooms.
I chose the mushroom omelet, which was served (again covered) with a fruit salad, yogurt, and “croissant.” Coffee was strong and appreciated after my extended slumber.
Kenya Airways will not win any awards for catering, but there was enough food on the flight with snacks available between meals.
Service
Where Kenya Airways should win an award was for the excellent service on my flight. I am going to dedicate a special post to the crew, but I want to commend Mohamed Khan, the purser onboard. From the very start, he set a professional yet fun tone. Instead of wishing us a great flight, he said, “We wish you a very pleasant safari.”
Ultimately, we were delayed 90 minutes due to late-arriving connecting passengers (myself included), but Khan, kept updated.
During the flight he was actively engaged in doing exactly what a purser should be doing, namely chatting wtih passngers to ensure they were comfortable. I greatly appreciated the small talk and his love for his job.
I also want to thank Sang, the flight attendant who worked my side of the aisle, for her great service onboard.
After the plane landed, I asked if I could take a picture with the crewmembers and they happily agreed.
Service is the most important hallmark of a great flight and the service was attentive, courteous, warm and overall outstanding on this longhaul flagship service to New York.
CONCLUSION
After over 14 hours onboard, it was nice to step off the plane…and shortly onto my six hour connecting flight to LAX on United. I would (and will) fly Kenya Airways business class again and found it to be a nice product overall, despite the lack of wi-fi internet and relatively small meals. Is Kenya Airways really “The Pride Of Africa?” After this flight and in light of the fall of South African Airways, I’d say the answer is yes.
I had no idea masks were required on Kenya Airways and glad to find out before I booked. I’ve been meaning to try this route to avoid traveling to NBO through Europe and adding many hours to my journey, but I think I’m long past being able to wear a mask for 15 hours. The nonstop routing however is extremely compelling, especially since AMS has become such a sh!tshow.
Really good pic with the crew – the warmth you testified to coming from the crew is evident in the photo (which is why I think it’s a really good pic)
“I ordered a hamburger for purposes of this review from the “midnight snack” menu.”
Unlike the Main Course you should have ordered all the midnight snack options if you’re doing it for “this review.” It’ll give your readers flavor and pictures of the various options.
WOW that’s a lot of pictures especially of the seats. Being that was a night flight how did you manage to not wake others? I remember a night flight from SEA to CDG via Iceland Air there was a blogger on in Saga class taking so many pictures causing the other passengers to complain so much the FA’s shut him down, the main cause flashes from his cameras
One thing I never do is use a flash when taking pictures – once I get the new iPhone it will be even better.
Instead of wishing us a great flight, he said, “We wish you a very pleasant safari.”
I mean, I get it, but it still doesn’t make sense.
If safari means ‘trip’ or ‘journey’ in Swahili, then why does it not make sense?
That’s exactly what safari means 🙂
Chicken Supreme is supposed to be a boneless bird breast with a hard sear on the skin. The rendered fat is turned into a veloute based sauce. You were served a grilled chicken breast with packaged gravy. You know is Haute cuisine when the bread is as big as the entrée.
Honestly, I like the simplicity of the menu in terms of description of the food. Usually, airlines go out of their way to describe something like potato wedges using the most indirect, descriptive culinary terms, but the menu describes the food in an honest way in my opinion and I like that. It also doesn’t look bad, either. I’ll take the food here than a KLM meal in J with catering from a North American airport any day.
Hi Matt, Thank you for this review – enjoyable to read. It has been years since we flew on an African carrier, so it was nice to get a different perspective – we just stick to BA.
I believe the picture of the flight map is for your previous flight from JNB to NBO? Also, I think the summary at the top needs to state NBO to JFK.
Your moving map picture is from the JNB-NBO sector.
Also, KQ is as much of a basket case financially as SAA was. The jury is out whether they will even survive, especially as the new administration is basically cutting them off from future bailouts. Don’t get too attached! 🙂
i feel like i’m missing something in this review…the seats were 2-2-2, so definitely not ideal w/o direct isle access and no privacy, the catering was worse then United, the IFE wasn’t great, no wifi, but you had a great crew. And yet you give them a glowing review? In reality you have lots of options to get from Africa to USA esp if you are willing to add a stop. Yes, Kenya Airways may be the best option of an African airline (i don’t know but i’ll take your word for it), but it still doesn’t appear to be good based on your review.
UA certainly has the better seat and its catering is not much worse. Plus, UA has wi-fi. I did like the personalized service on KQ and would be happy to fly KQ again…that’s not to say I prefer it to KL or AF with the extra stop.
15 hours to go 1801 miles!?
Fixed. NBO-JFK was the route…
Never been on Kenya Airways but have flown Ethiopian non- stop JNB- ADD and then ADD- ORD on a A350-900. Beautiful flight, service and crew. The food was good enough.
That looks like an OK business class flight in 2013. I’m glad you enjoyed it, and 55K Flying Blue miles is surely a deal, but do you think they’re really better than Ethiopian.
Same seat as Ethiopian (on some jets) and I like the Ethiopian food on ET, but not a huge fan of the western food. I’ll review ET again next year and then compare them.
Ha that’s a fair comment. However it’s surprising now refreshing and important good leg room is. I even like certain seats on the BA old biz and United’s old 2x2x2 purely for the room. I’ll never pick a throne seat again
I flew Kenya Airways Business class round trip from JFK to Nairobi to start my 15 day safari in Kenya and Tanzania. I wanted to do the gorilla trek in Rwanda and flew on KA too. I throughly enjoyed my flights and the crew was wonderful and took care of anything that was requested. I will definitely fly KA again.
I’ve never flown with Kenya but I rate Ethiopian pretty highly and would regard them as the best of the current African operators. The seats are not disimilar, the crews almost invariably warm and friendly and the food service much better. It’s probably the only airline where on each flight, I’ve looked at the menu and would be happy with any of the choices.
Excellent review of #KQ … #ThePrideOfAfrica
I must say if this is business class food, I dread to think what Economy looks like. You are right that excellent service will usually supersede disappointing meals, and the crew sound and look fantastic! Also the amenities pack is quite budget. I suppose they do keep their air fares quite low, so expectations should be measured.