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Review: Hong Kong Airlines Business Class A330 Hong Kong to Bangkok

a stuffed monkey sitting on a seat in an airplane

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After traveling from LA to Hong Kong on an A350, doing a bit of lounge hopping at HKG ( Autus and Centurion), and hearing reports of a Typhoon, we were anxious to get on the plane before our delay turned into a cancellation. Luckily we did, and while Hong Kong Airlines regional business class isn’t anything to write home about, it’s spacious enough, offered friendly service, and was a comfy ride for a relatively short flight.

Initial impression

Red, red everywhere. I’m liking the theme, but the plane has distinctly seen better days, and had a particular scent to it upon entering the aircraft. With that said, we were met with smiling faces and a welcoming crew.

The Deets:

  • When: August 2018
  • Where: Hong Kong to Bangkok
  • Cabin: Business
  • Aircraft: A330
  • Seats: 12A,C
  • Flight Time: 2 hours 45 mins

Cabin Layout:

Here are the details from SeatGuru. 2-2-2 layout with angled seats.  While we both fell asleep due to exhaustion…this route, and the seats are best suited for comfort and relaxation.

And in real life:

the inside of an airplane with rows of seats

Seats:

If you’re looking for guaranteed aisle access…go with the middle seats. As you can see in the pic above, both of them have it, whereas the paired seats on the window pin one passenger in. I found the seat to be decently wide at 21 inches, but there is no storage to speak of, and the crew insist upon personal items being stowed in the overhead upon take off and landing. As I mentioned before, the seats show quite a bit of wear and tear, which I don’t really mind, but I did notice remnants of the prior occupant, which is unacceptable ( I attribute this to potentially accelerating the turnaround to avoid further delay, and wasn’t was I experienced on the return route or the long hauls).

IFE and seat controls are on the right side, power on the left. Write it off to jetlag, but I found the seat controls hard to locate. They’re in a flip up panel. There is a the littlest of storage “sleeves” under the power outlets.

They do assign quite large water holders.

Service and food:

We were offered pre-departure juice and water as well as menus. Seeing as though we’d already had food on our long haul, and food in the lounge, I opted for just a glass of red wine and dessert. Both were lackluster. I’d highly recommend getting some of the noodles in Autus prior to departure.

Overall:

The flight was really everything I expected, and if you compare intra-Asia business class with intra-European or even American it far exceeds most anything you’ll receive in terms of hard product comfort. For a two hour flight, and one that was INCREDIBLY choppy ( we flew around/over a lightning storm that was the worst I can remember) it was nice to be able to recline way back, nod off for a bit, and watch a movie.

You may get lucky tho…rumor is that Hong Kong Airlines is running their brand new A350 with Super Diamonds on this very route, so I would keep an eye out…it’ll look like this – UH-mazing.

Opinions, reviews, analyses & recommendations are the author’s alone, and have not been reviewed, endorsed or approved by any of these entities.

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