ANA doubles in-flight entertainment choice on international flights

Here is a blatant attempt at free advertising, but ANA will still probably have nothing we are interested in. How about live band, or strippers? Now that would make the time pass. Or how about a little leg room? Ah, now that is beyond their imagination.

ANA is a really good airline. I really enjoy flying with them.

I gotta try ANA.

Meanwhile, Northwest Airlines has changed planes on its Narita<>Bankok route from the A330 with personal TV screens to a 757 with 3 or 4 TV monitors on the ceiling. Looks like ANA is moving in the right direction. Good job!

ANA is great if you are a double amputee. In Economy Class it has at least 1 inch less leg room than United. I'm only 5'10" and my knees hit the back of the seat in front of my on ANA, whereas there is at least an inch of room in United Economy Class. Its easy to throw a little more video entertainment on the TV -- ask them to pull a few rows of seats out to extend the room by an inch in Economy Class and they will say "Japanese have short legs, the added room is not needed." So what that are basically doing is giving foreign customers the finger...

ANA for midgets. And food not great. NWA only good for going to Guam - anywhere else a rip off.

I have to agree with some of the folks here. I would rather ANA give more leg room than entertainment. There's enough of the latter already.

Tatanka: I'm smaller than you and even I find it ridiculously cramped. I travelled with ANA and Virgin in the spave of a week and noticed a big difference. I've just come back from the new year celebrations in Korea, and Korean Airlines was sooo spacious compared to ANA. I do like ANA's service, but the legroom is awful.

ANA sucks when you are in CATTLE class. The seats make you feel like you booty is in a vice and then there is the lack of leg room for anyone over 4 feet tall.

ANA and JAL have the smallest leg room I have seen on airlines. How about reducing the fuel tax and "doubling" the leg room?

ANA doubles in-flight entertainment

... and cuts pilot training by half ?

When you can't watch the movie because the screen is about 10m away and the audio channels have each 1h of music in loop (which you don't like anyways), take sleeping pills.

Tatanka - So what that are basically doing is giving foreign customers the finger...

The Japanese are getting bigger, many 16-17 year olds are now up to 5'10" and beyond, so not just a foreigner issue HOWEVER, I would rather suffer an inch less space than be subjected to the dire service offered by NWA, UAL, or AA. Continental are OKish. Save the jokes about the staff of these airlines, it is the culture of these airlines that needs serious adjusting. ANA do try to get you to enjoy your flight. Not quite in the Virgin league yet, but not as far off as most US based carriers.

BTW, I forgot to mention that I do hate ANA's domestic product which is WAY too cramped, too expensive and no "service" on board. JAL is the same I guess, but haven't flown as often. Here I would suffer the US airlines service if they priced reasonably (I can get to the UK cheaper than Okinawa sometimes - and get two meals and as much wine as I could want - same airline - whats the deal?)

Not sure i ( or various plane review websites) concur with the ANA small seat comments.

I've flown most of the airlines between Europe and Japan and Europe and USA.

For Europe Japan, the Japanese airlines always win on terms of service. linking to the recent BA story on Japan today, they are my worst direct or premium flight option. Its always such a rude awakening getting on a BA flight out of Japan.. bang, yeah welcome to British style hospitality and service.. as soon as you board the plane, an immediate contrast for Japanese to get used to or foreigners that are used to Japanese service standards. Add to that the strikes in recent years, the unreliable service, lost luggage, etc.. that's why they are doing so many campaigns. Even in business class, interesting (but not great) flat beds, but naff service, even ordering sake I found I can see the difference - the stewardess didn't have a clue and was asking the customers how to do her job ( but at least she was smiling and kind as versus BA cattle class service). Knowing staff on UK airlines and Japan airlines the crew on Japanese airlines really do worry a lot and get stressed about training and providing service and not making mistakes, this in relative contrast (in this example) to the relaxed attitude to life on uk airlines.

Virgin is ok service i find and the entertainment system on their flights has always been one of the better for a long time so ANA upgrading in this case is a good thing. Air France again is ok/good for service plus the food and free champagne is good/notable once you are on the flight, but let down big time by the ground service and using CDG as an interconnecting airport is regularly unreliable often resulting in having to take a day later flight many times. ANA has one up on the Europe routes as it one of the few that offers evening flights to Japan.

Comparing flying all over I would not say the seat pitch on ANA flights is notably small. In fact if you look up the data on seatguru type websites you will find the average seat pitch for international flights is larger on ana versus say american or BA or virgin. Of course individual aircraft vary. JAL does seem to have a small average seat pitch on those websites though.

I completely agree with those who complain about the leg room, and it's especially sad because ANA used to be one of the best airlines for leg room, with a 34" seat pitch. The change to a 31" seat pitch with a 16.5" seat width occurred after ANA added its premium economy section. They made room for it by scrunching all the regular economy seats together. Note that besides being narrower and closer together, the seats are also shorter front to back, so that a larger person's thighs are not well-supported.

I love ANA's service, meals, and in-flight entertainment, but I'm 5'10", and the idea of spending 13 hours in the vice-like grip of its economy seats has sent me to other airlines until and unless I can afford to pay for its premium economy product. As things stand, I would not recommend ANA's or JAL's regular economy to anyone over 5'6".

I hope that someone from the Japanese airlines is reading these comments, because I would like to reward their otherwise fine service.

United Business Class is great. Much better than ANA or JAL.

"United Business Class is great"

Sure, if you have 200,000-300,000 yen to blow on one flight.

okapake,

No way. F and C-Class service (and quality of flight attendants) on UA and AA is miles behind most, if not all, of the Asian carriers on a trans-pacific route.