My two-hour journey from Atlanta to Chicago on a Delta Air Lines 737-900ER in first class was a very calm flight with excellent service, which helped to offset an annoying air traffic control delay.
Delta Air Lines 737-900ER First Class Review
I originally booked a Los Angeles – Chicago one-way ticket via Minneapolis for $381 in first class, but did a confirmed same-day change to route via Atlanta so that I could fly Delta One from LAX-ATL. That flight arrived slightly behind schedule, leaving me very little time to transit from the F Concourse to B Concourse at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport.
One detail I forgot when I wrote about my very tight connection in Atlanta was that my flight to Chicago was scheduled to depart at 5:25 pm but suddenly changed to depart five minutes early at 5:20 pm! What was that all about?!
In any case, I made it to my gate huffing and puffing, settled in, only to find out that we would sit on the ground for 90 minutes to wait out a ground delay due to congestion in the airspace around ORD.
Delta Air Lines 327
Atlanta (ATL) – Chicago (ORD)
Saturday, May 9
Depart: 5:25 PM
Arrive: 6:34 PM
Duration: 02hr, 09min
Distance: 606 miles
Aircraft: Boeing 737-900ER
Seat: 3B (First Class)
I was last to board and found my seat in 3B. Thankfully there was plenty of overhead bin space left, though I was traveling only with my duffel bag, so I could have placed it under the seat in front of me if necessary.
Seats
Delta’s 737-900ER first class cabin includes 20 recliner-style seats spread across five rows in a 2-2 configuration.
I was seated in 3B, an aisle seat on the left side of the aircraft. The seat itself was perfectly comfortable for a domestic first class flight and after a couple flights on Delta’s “new” first class, I liked flying in the “old” seat. It had decent padding, a reasonable recline of seven inches, and 37 inches of legroom. At 20.9 inches wide, it also did not feel narrow.
Seat controls were located on the side of the seat and there was a center console between seats with a small cocktail table.
The seat had standard domestic first class power, including an A/C outlet (between seats) and USB-A port (under IFE monitor). Both worked during the flight.
Overhead, there were personal air vents.
IFE + Wi-Fi
One area where Delta continues to shine is inflight entertainment. Each first class seat on this 737-900 had a seatback screen.
The screen was crisp, responsive, and loaded with movies, TV shows, music, games, flight information, and live TV. I did not watch a full movie on this flight, but I did watch I Love Lucy, which is a program I loved dearly as a child but have not watched in many years.
There was also a moving map, which is my default entertainment on most flights.
These older planes don’t have Bluetooth audio, but complimentary earphones were provided.
Delta offers free Wi-Fi for SkyMiles members on many domestic aircraft, and that was available on this flight. Connecting was straightforward: join the onboard network, log in with a SkyMiles account, and you are online.
While not blazing fast, speeds were sufficient for web browsing, and light work.
Wi-Fi remains a genuine competitive advantage for Delta, especially compared to United, which has vastly inferior Wi-Fi on non-Starlink aircraft and charges $8-10 for Wi-Fi on each domestic flight, regardless of length.
Lavatory
There was a lavatory at the front of the aircraft for first class passengers, a standard 737 lavatory, which is to say it was small and purely functional. There was no special provisioning, but I do appreciate the Grown Alchemist soap and hand cream.
That said, it was clean when I used it, and that matters more than anything else.
Food + Drink
At only 606 miles, the flight fell under the 900-mile meal service threshold. Instead a snack basket was offered with chips, cookies, nuts, granola bars, and chocolate. The full bar was open, however, though I just had Fever Tree club soda and a couple packets of pistachios…a perfect snack prior to dinner.
While I understand why Delta does not serve meals on flights this short, it sure would be a nice if a heartier meal was offered, something like a salad or warm sandwich…but that’s just not what the market seems to dictate in the USA, especially when American Airlines and United Airlines also do not serve meals on flights less than 900 miles.
Service
The service was absolutely lovely on this flight. Flight attendants were very attentive, offering several rounds of beverages during the group delay and again the air. I waited until everyone else got off the plane to take a couple of the cabin shots above and enjoyed the small talk while waiting. The captain also came out to join the conversation and offered me some trading cards for my children, which was quite nice.
CONCLUSION
We pulled up to an extremely quiet Terminal 5. Unfortunately, the gate we parked at, M7, and the position of the windows made it very hard to get a shot of the aircraft.
As an aside, I had hoped to stop by the Delta Sky Club upon landing to review that as well, but it closes at 6:00 pm on Saturdays. Oh well…
Despite the delay, this was a very pleasant flight on Delta.
Thanks to actual IFE screens… still better than American, Alaska, Southwest, and United, most of which do no have ’em.
I’d say United is getting better. The odds have been at least 50-50 lately for me.
Our online-complaining is paying off! Bah!
20.9″ seat width is still not very good; that needs to be improved, for true comfort on these longer flights.
82% of UA aircraft have seatback screens most of which are superior in quality and size to DL’s older AVOD, and 10% of DL’s fleet still lacks seatback screens.
The only DL mainline fleet that doesn’t have AVOD is the 717 and a flew of the used 739 – which makes close to a 90% AVOD rate on DL.
and DL doesn’t have all those pesky tiny RJs that not only don’t have AVOD but also clog up the nation’s airspace. THAT is why this and other flights were delayed.
btw, if you have been tracking on-time performance, UA has spectacularly fallen in its on-time performance thanks to the very predictable summer thunderstorms and the previously mentioned capacity dump which is backfiring.
oh, and UA didn’t succeed at pushing AA out of ORD. or acquiring.
Seems like a win-win-win for just about everyone
Yes LTD, 10% without = 90% with. Excellent cyphering. Also, none of DLC or UAX RJs have AVOD and UAX has 100 more RJs than DLC. Heck, UA mainline has 130 more aircraft than DL including 55 more wide body aircraft currently and 50 (95 with 359s) more on order. UA also has 84% more wide body lie flat beds and twice as many wide body Economy/Comfort Plus seats than DL. Amazing, right?
put your tools back in your pants. You are as insecure as a, well, Scott Kirby.
Matthew enjoyed his flight and DL has delivered a higher quality product for years.
oh, and UA cancelled 5% and delayed 1/3 of its flights yesterday for the worst performance of the big 4.
on top of what has happened for the past couple weeks.
and we are still waiting for you to explain how UA managed to beat DL in earnings last in 1Q2025 and end up w/ a $1.6 billion earnings deficit by the end of the year – even with a $1 billion labor cost advantage which will be gone by the end of this year – on top of the fuel cost disadvantage UA has to DL.
again, put your tools away. DL has and wil have a higher percentage of its network seats with AVOD than AA or UA.
The prince of projection. One day of thunderstorms is all you’ve got? Poor tiny Tim.
you haven’t been trackinng operaitonal performance for at least a month.
I can assure you that UA’s run of supposedly displacing DL has ended, in part because of predictable summer weather and in part because of UA’s “Need” to overshcedule ORD with a bunh of low coapacity small RJ.s
No wonder the FAA stepped in and capped UA operations at a major hub airport. Again.
and you forget to tell us how UA went from industry leading in finances in the first quarter to a billion and a half net earnings deficit by the end of the year.
Your incessant need to jump in to claim a title that anyone can see is fleeting at best is why oou make such an easy target.
It is not the operational disruptions, but the slow recovery from them in Delta’s case that is the issue especially compared to what used to be their superior performance in that regard. Not even close these days. The Richard Anderson era is long gone. Too bad.
UA’s past month of operational under performance sounds like a recovery and expecetations problem
but thanks for skirting the reality that UA will always have a lower percentage of its fleet with AVOD as long as it operates a much higher percentage of RJs than DL – on top of the fact that DL has a higher percentage of its fleet w/ AVOD NOW.
how about you learn to accept other people’s positive perceptions about DL instead of incessantly trying to tell us that UA is better when clear facts and data show they are not?
If a five-minute schedule change has you huffing and puffi9ng to the gate, perhaps you need to modify your airport arrival routine. 🙂
See here:
https://liveandletsfly.com/10-minute-connection-atlanta-airport/
DL’s 739’s are the most cramped ac in their fleet. Bulkhead FC legroom is comically minimal. No mention of the thumbnail size FC lav?
And why they don’t remove those damn IFE touch screen games is beyond me. TAP TAP TAP back of my head all flight long; never fails I get an adult child behind me.
How did you get the pics of the empty plane, since you were the last to board?
I hung around when we landed in ORD.
Just as I suspected. What a journalist! 🙂
For aviation enthusiasts → That DL B737-800 arriving from SLC, visible in the article’s photo, is 25.2 years old and is currently parked at JFK.
For aviation enthusiasts → DL currently has 163 B737-900ERs (average age: 10.5 years) in its fleet.
Another peaceful flight with DL in calm skies…
For those that cook throw those little bags of nuts in the freezer. Perfect for making stuff as needed. No waste and yes I am thrifty.
“Beware of little expenses; a small leak will sink a great ship.” – Benjamin Franklin –