I talked yesterday about Southwest’s broader plan coming out of its investor day, but today I want to talk about the most significant change, Southwest’s decision to assign all seats and add an extra legroom section. Before we start, I should say that there is a lot we know, but there are still things we don’t. In other words, I don’t have all the answers, but we do know a lot, enough that Southwest let us walk through an airplane with the new seats and cabin design so we could see what the future holds.
Let’s start with the new look and feel. If you like blue, you’re going to like what Southwest has planned.
The New Seat
The new Recaro seats are dark blue like the seats you see on Southwest today, but there is a new light blue accent on the headrests. And extra legroom seats have more of a light blue accent at the top of the seat itself. You can see this most clearly in row 16 on the 737-8 MAX where the window seat has extra legroom since there is no seat in front but the aisle and middle are regular seats.
There is more blue in the carpet design as well. Add in the cool blue mood lighting, and it’s just all so blue….
The seat itself has a device holder along with the USB charger that will charge your laptops. The tray table was designed with cupholders on both the left and right, so lefties aren’t ignored.
And in a nifty little add-on, the seatback pocket down below has water bottle holders built-in.
The broad idea is to have a lot of extra legroom seats, more than most airlines with the product. Let’s talk about each aircraft type individually, starting with the ones we didn’t see.
737-700
The old ladies of the fleet are going to remain the worst experience unless you’re a tall person. This aircraft will lose a row, dropping from 143 to 137 seats. It will then have 40 extra legroom seats with a whopping 36″ of pitch. Everything else will be at 31″.
The worst part of this plan is that the -700s will not get new seats. They will keep the same seats and just have them recovered in the new design. They will not get power.
If this feels like lipstick on a pig, it is. These airplanes will be gone by the end of the decade, so apparently Southwest thinks it’s ok to just let them limp along. If you’re tall, the extra legroom section is great. If you’re not, avoid this airplane.
737-7 MAX
Assuming that Boeing will some day get the -7 certified, this airplane will join Southwest’s fleet with 148 seats instead of the original plan for 150. Extra legroom seats will be at 34″ of pitch with the rest at 31″. These airplanes will have Southwest’s new Recaro seats with USB power that were revealed to us at the event. There’s no real reason to talk about this airplane yet, so let’s skip ahead.
737-8 MAX/737-800
These aircraft make up the bulk of Southwest’s fleet and will continue to have 175 seats onboard. Instead of having 32″ of seat pitch across the board, there will be 68 seats in the extra legroom sections with 34″ of pitch. The rest will drop to 31″ of pitch.
As of now, there are more than 120 aircraft that have Southwest’s newish Meridian seat that has power installed. Those will keep those seats but be recovered in the new design and moved around to create the extra legroom section. Once everything is approved by the FAA, new deliveries will get the new Recaro seats. There are apparently about 60 of these airplanes that still have the old seats. I believe these will be replaced with the new Recaro seats when the time comes, but some of those may end up being sold off anyway, so we’ll see.
Southwest had a brand-spanking new MAX in the hangar for us with the new seats onboard, but those will be ripped out and the regular seats will be installed so it can enter service.
I’d like to say the seats are comfortable including the oversized headrest, but I sat in them for 10 minutes. Until I can sit for a couple hours, it’s hard to say if they are really comfortable.
I can say that the legroom is good for me, even in the regular seats. But I am only 5’8″. Here’s how it looks as I apparently do my best Alfalfa impression.
The cabin is broken into four different areas. Here’s the real seat map which doesn’t differ all that much from the guess I mocked up two months ago:
The first five rows on each side make up 30 extra legroom seats. There is only a row 1 on the starboard side of the aircraft, so that means in row 6, the port side has extra legroom while the starboard side does not. Curious what that looks like? Wait no longer…
That next chunk of seats in front of the exit includes 45 regular seats which will fall into the “preferred” cabin, meaning you’ll pay extra to reserve these seats in advance.
How the exit rows fall is somewhat unclear to me. The six seats in row 14 appeared to have extra legroom, but they do not recline. The four seats in row 15 are the worst, being both regular seats and having no recline. I don’t know if that will be considered preferred or regular. Same goes for the four aisle/middle in row 16, although those do recline. The two windows in row 16 are the same unlimited legroom seats that exist today.
Behind those are another 30 extra legroom seats. Those are followed by the final 54 seats which are the regular seat section.
What’s the difference between regular and preferred? Nothing, except that preferred is further forward, and so Southwest thinks it can charge extra for those.
So how will this all work in practice? Let’s go through it.
How It Works
If you book a ticket at the lowest fare, which Southwest will still call Wanna Get Away, you will not get a seat assignment in advance. You have three choices if you buy that fare:
- Wait until check-in, and you will be assigned a seat. I do not know if you will be able to select or change your seat after it’s auto-assigned or not yet. But if the regular section is full, you might find yourself in preferred or extra legroom, I suppose.
- You can purchase a seat in the preferred section as an add-on.
- You can purchase a seat in the extra legroom section as an add-on.
You won’t have the option to buy a seat in the regular section as an add-on. That is held for those who book the higher fare categories.
Wanna Get Away+ will include a regular seat assignment. What if the regular seats are all taken? We don’t know yet what that means. Regardless, you can also buy up to preferred or extra legroom seat from that fare if you want, but it’s going to be important to look at the seat map before deciding what to buy.
As for Anytime and Business Select, we don’t know anything. They haven’t decided which attributes will be included in those fares, but you can assume that they will include increasingly more goodies the higher up you go.
We do know that if you are an A-List Preferred top tier member, you will be able to reserve extra legroom seats for free at time of booking. If you’re regular A-List, you can reserve those for free at check-in. I assume either one will be able to assign seats in preferred or regular cabins at time of booking on any fare. This makes A-List status far more beneficial and important than it is today.
As of now, we don’t know if the extra legroom section will include anything else like free drinks and all that, but it is possible. Stay tuned.
Meet the New Boarding, Same as the Old Boarding
There’s also news on the boarding front. Southwest is going to keep the boarding poles that it uses today.
As I see it, there are two good reasons for this. First, Southwest already has these poles, and it wouldn’t be cheap to reconfigure every gate area. Second, this allows Southwest to control the boarding process. It can assign people to different boarding groups and positions to make it easier to get people on the airplane at the right time. This will making boarding go more quickly, and it will get rid of the gate lice that plague other airlines.
So when is this all happening? It takes time to do something like this, but Southwest’s timeline is actually pretty fast considering what has to be done.
The Timeline
The airline is beginning the FAA certification process for the seats now and will be done in the first half of 2025. After that, the retrofit will happen fast with 50 to 100 aircraft per month being completed. It’ll be done by the end of 2025.
The technology plan also starts now, and that takes the longest of anything. There are apparently more than 60 systems that need to be updated, and the airline needs to do a lot of testing each step along the way. Tech will be fully completed by the end of 2025.
This will be a hard cutover. One day the airline will have a systemwide network of open seating. The next day, it will all be assigned. We don’t have exact dates yet, but they will start selling in the second half of 2025 for travel in the first half of 2026.
Until that time, get ready for some surprise and delight. Airplanes will have extra legroom long before they start flying with paid and assigned seating. That means anyone will be able to take those seats, so I imagine those A1-15 early boarding positions will be in high demand on the day of travel.
It’s hard to overstate just how big of a task this entire thing is. That being said, the plan seems possible — FAA approval-permitting — and well thought-through. I look forward to seeing this come together.
56 comments on “A Detailed Look at Southwest’s Assigned and Extra Legroom Seating Plan”
Early in the post “a lot of blue” was mentioned, but it didn’t hit home until I saw the side profile shots with Brett sitting in the seats… Wow. I suggest we call this new interior schema the “Blue Light Special”.
Southwest already has the carafes of steaming mediocre coffee, so it just needs some dirty aprons for the FAs to wear while serving hearty meals and the planes will really feel like diners. :-)
I’ll be interested to see if Southwest can actually meet its own timeline for this, given its historical challenges with tech. I’m sure Southwest will test things extenstively, so I wouldn’t be surprised to see the “hard switchover” date pushed back. Despite the tests behind the scenes, I dare say that many savvy fliers will try to avoid flying WN around the time of its cutover, given the heightened risk of systems meltdowns then.
Nah, the Blue Light Special was a K-mart thing. I can remember it when I was a kid.
Diners had Blue Plate Specials. I could maybe see “Blue Plane Special” here…
Ah, thanks for the correction. “Blue Plane Special” does have a nice ring to it.
What’s the revenue potential of assigned and premium seating vs early boarding upsells, especially given the loss of seats for the former? But perhaps more importantly, does the US have the demand for 200,000 more premium seats per day?
Don’t know if the demand is there for all those premium seats, but I wonder if Elliott even cares as all they see are dollar signs & care not about the customer. Fliers to them are an afterthought.
And bank and hospital mergers all are just great for consumers. Customers seem to be the last consideration.
Eric C – Southwest’s math on that is on page 83 of the deck https://www.southwestairlinesinvestorrelations.com/~/media/Files/S/Southwest-IR/documents/20240926-luv-investor-day.pdf
Speaking of tech, there isnt a web site or app I use that takes longer to load on startup than Southwest web site and app Doesnt matter whether it is my phone, ipad, or computer
The assigned seating had to be done since southwest had no interest in limiting preborders or people trying to save seats
I am 5’10” and thought economy seating was solid. The padding not so good.
My other gripe would be the lack of service on longer flights. I am using flying about 2,000 miles so 4-5 hrs and only one drink service is bad considering how quickly you can get dehydrated flying.
Prior to 2024 I had not flown Southwest in years but with the companion pass and only real nonstop flights I have been flying them more often. Unfortunately getting a flight on time has been a rarity with waiting for arriving crews to be a common delay.
I just bring a water bottle on with me – a tiny cup of water doesn’t do much for me anyway.
UA has a row with the port side seats being regular pitch and the starboard seats in the same row being extra pitch on the Max -9s. This is due to the mid-cabin lav replacing row 7 on the port side and the rows being staggered from there until row 14 where the anomaly comes in. Starting at that row they get equaled.
Has any other airline done this boarding number + assigned seat thing? What about those boarding simulation studies? I am sure I am missing something. But it sounds very efficient at the first glance.
KLM did something like it on a few flights back in 2013.
“ Passengers get a boarding number at the gate. This number is based on their seat in the aircraft. When boarding begins, the numbers are displayed in a sequence on screens at the gate. The order in which the numbers are displayed ensures that passengers with a window seat board first, starting at the rear of the aircraft. They are followed by passengers seated in the midsection of the aircraft, after which the passengers with aisle seats are allowed to board. This ensures that passengers can wait their turn in the comfort of the lounge, instead of waiting in line and having to step over other passengers. As always, disabled passengers and parents with babies will be allowed to board first. SkyPriority passengers are given the lowest numbers and will go on board next.
At present, the new procedure will apply on three flights a day, to Berlin, Budapest and Helsinki. During the trial period, the procedure will be further optimised. KLM intends to expand this boarding procedure to other European and intercontinental flights during the course of the coming year.”
So basically, at WN it is 1999 and they are turning the page to how the industry has been running since 2000. Nothing impressive here. WN is going to taken private, broken up, and parceled out to the rest of the industry.
WN is going to taken private, broken up, and parceled out to the rest of the industry.
Are you making the same prediction for WN as others here have made for B6? Or have you watched “Wall Street” one too many times.
I loved Blue Star Airlines. Best bagels in the sky.
Yeah, def considering either cancelling my WN credit card after reading this: Dont like where they are going: they are turning into every other airline. Especially with the pay-“Preferred” seating at the front. Ugh. Ive got one trip currently booked on Southwest (in just about a month); I might just either cancel the card or else drop it all the way down to the no-annual-fee version (does Chase still offer that?) after that trip is done.
I dropped United’s card when they went to heck. Every FF change was bad for the customers. I have received many free trips with points on SWA. But if they go to heck too, what does a customer do? They all treat customers like dirt.
Count me among those who hopes the door doesn’t hit free-for-all boarding in the butt on the way out. I have loathed it from the first time I flew Southwest and never warmed to the idea. The extent to which people just ignore their assigned position and board whenever they want without so much as a peep from the ineffective, half-interested gate agents made what *could* have been an interesting alternative into a non-starter. Either strictly enforce it or get rid of it. I’m glad SW is finally doing one of the two.
When I was younger, I only cared about paying as little as possible and never took the bait for better seating, yadda yadda. But I’ve realized that flying is irritating enough and life is short. I don’t even think twice about opting up now, regardless of airline. A few extra bucks so I can stretch out my legs or get off faster or whatever is a nice perk—I’m glad Southwest will have something for me. So overall, I’m cautiously optimistic. But oh boy, I’m going to avoid SW during that transition period at the beginning of 2026. Think of the great unhorsed masses who aren’t going to know any of this is coming and are poorly enabled to handle even the slightest amount of change. Buckle up!
What’s sad is I didn’t really like the open seating policy but would prefer it over this. Not a fan of the “preferred” section. And also not a fan of WGA not being able to pick a seat (even in the back) without a fee. I wish they would only charged for the extra legroom seats. Those add value. But it feels like they are charging for what used to be free and I’m not a fan. Though I realize I’m saying that knowing they didn’t have assigned seats before. But it just doesn’t sit with me. It reminds me of pre-American US Airways. I hope they rethink this a tad. I doubt they will, but I can always hope.
None of this is for the consumer. The very specific intention here is to make the consumer pay more for less so Elliott et al can take more money from you.
Boarding position A25 for seat 24B at gate C23 … what could go wrong?
THIS!! People can’t even figure out their seat assignments on other airlines. I can’t even imagine what a cluster this could be.
Oh it happens. When I was a gate agent for AA, I had just sent out my 0610 flight from gate C11. Along comes a passenger looking for the 0630 flight to DAL. She was a gate C11 but her boarding pass showed boarding position C11. Needless to say she did miss her flight as Southwest was on the other side of the airport at that time.
I’m curious about what happens to families who don’t pay for seats: will they be assigned seats together when possible? Some airlines, like European legacies, will usually seat you together at check-in (even though it’s not guaranteed); others, like some LCCs, specifically say they won’t. I wonder where Southwest will fall.
I know that was one of the things that Alaska agreed to with the Hawaiian merger:
“Guaranteeing fee-free family seating: Hawaiian Airlines must join Alaska Airlines in guaranteeing adjacent seats for children 13 or under and an accompanying adult at no additional cost for all fare types.”
https://www.transportation.gov/briefing-room/usdot-requires-alaska-and-hawaiian-airlines-preserve-rewards-value-critical-flight
I don’t think in this case there’s anyplace for the DoT to step in and push its consumer goals to force the issue, but if Southwest wants to stay in DoT’s good graces they might go ahead and do something like that.
What happens with the unsold “extra-legrooms”?
Eduardo – Elites get it free, but if they don’t sell, they will have to just upgrade people if the flight is full.
Wouldn’t be surprised if the “wheel chair” people who are gaming the system for early boarding and seat selection discover a way to turn this into a free extra legroom seat.
Perhaps one day you will end up in a wheelchair so you see what it’s truly like having no option but to use a wheelchair when traveling. Then you can see how pushy and nasty snobs like you become when they are so afraid they won’t get their precious preferred seat. Grow up and stop taking your frustrations out on disabled folks. Not everyone is trying to “hack” the system like you suggest.
Read my post again. My comment was directed towards the small number of people who are gaming the system, not those who legitimately use wheelchairs. The fact that you couldn’t understand this, and then resorted to insults tells me everything I need to know about you. Maybe you’re the one who needs to “grow up”.
Brett, can you talk about Family Boarding? One of SWA’s competitive advantages (for our household) is that we can board together after A60 and get seats next to the kids. If families book WGA (non-plus) fares under the new seating model, will they be stripped of their high likelihood of having seats next to each other? Or are families going to be basically blackmailed (by SWA) into paying for choose-a-seat so that kids and parents aren’t separated?
I wrote my lengthy comment below before I saw this one. My read is that your final point is right – families are essentially being pushed to buying up to WGA+, or buying a preferred seat add-on to a WGA fare. This basically aligns with the rest of the LCC industry, but it’s an unpleasant change that is going to make a lot of longtime Southwest customers upset.
So much concern about family seating, but this is a non-issue. The feds are working through rules on this anyway. I am sure that Southwest will guarantee families with young kids sit together. How they do it, I bet that hasn’t been fully fleshed out yet. But it’s not going to be a problem.
The DOT conditions on the Alaska-Hawaiian merger guarantee “adjacent seats for children 13 or under and an accompanying adult”. That just means that every child ends up with at least one adult, but if there are two or more adults on the booking you can still get split up. That’s the bare minimum, and every carrier already does that anyway (even on base fares on Spirit/Frontier/etc.), because it’s just obviously not acceptable to seat young children separately from their parents if they’re on the flight.
Most people have a pretty strong preference for keeping their entire family together, not just the bare minimum of “make sure each kid is with at least one adult”. The concern is that Wanna Get Away fares won’t enable that. There are definitely ways for Southwest to address it, but it’s definitely tricky to do without eliminating the value of a buy-up to WGA+.
Good to know. Thanks for your keen insight, Brett. Keep it up!
SW’s version of preferred seating is a lot fairer than other airlines where every seat that is not a middle seat becomes a “preferred” seat.
The new seat assignment sounds like it’s going to make Wanna Get Away fares non-viable for families. If all the WGA+ passengers get to select seats from an open seat map, then the remaining seats available at check-in are going to be fragmented, and Southwest won’t have any option other than to split up families in at least some cases.
I’m currently willing to pay a premium for Southwest in part because it provides reasonable certainty that I’ll be able to sit with my wife and 2 kids without buying a seat assignment as an add-on.
As an example, I checked prices for a one-way flight to Orlando in January. My airport has nonstops from Frontier, Spirit, and Southwest:
– On Frontier, to get assigned seats I would either need to add assigned seats for $29 each ($116 total), or buy the “Economy Bundle” for all 4 passengers for an extra $59 each ($236 total)
– On Spirit, I need to add assigned seats for $15 each ($60 total), or buy a “Go Savvy” fare for an extra $45 each ($180 total)
– On Southwest, I could add EarlyBird Check-In for $35 each ($140 total), but I don’t generally find that necessary. As long as I check in on time and am willing to sit in the back of the plane, I’ve had no problems getting seats that keep my family together by boarding during Family Boarding.
Southwest’s new system will be mostly aligned with the new “bundle” systems used by both Frontier and Spirit, with a “basic economy”-style base option that is almost guaranteed to result in splitting your group up. This decreases the value of Southwest a bit for me – I’ll still be willing to pay a premium for their better schedule and frequency, but in the future I’ll be comparing their Wanna Get Away+ options vs. the bundle options on other LCCs.
I think the transition might result in some negative customer experiences and bad PR – folks who are used to flying their family on Southwest are going to be quite upset if they suddenly find their family split up on the plane for the first time. Some ideas Southwest could apply to their implementation to minimize this:
– Don’t allow customers to choose non-contiguous seats during seat selection. In other words, don’t let people play the “book the window and aisle seat, and hope no one takes the middle seat” game. Concerts and movie theaters don’t let you do this, and airlines shouldn’t either.
– Have the system automatically block off the least-preferred seats for groups with kids 6 and younger (corresponding to current Family Boarding) that bought Wanna Get Away fares. This ensures that at check-in time the system will have a reasonable place to seat them, though if this behavior is guaranteed, then it decreases the incentive for them to upgrade to WGA+.
On the other hand, you could fairly say that this is all working as intended – they’re going to get me to pay a little extra on the flights that I do take, and maybe even sign up for a credit card.
I wonder whether the retrofitted planes will get a different identifier in flight trackers, similar to how 73W was the Evolve seating 700 identifier when that started.
I’m guessing the answer is “yes”, so A1-15 will go quickly for those aircraft at T-24. Maybe to the point that WN can get some pricing/revenue uplift per flight before 2026 as A1-15 will approach 100% full as more planes get retrofitted.
Which also temporarily increases the value of the top tier credit card since those A1-15 free passes will be worth more.
On the topic of the card, betting that the top two cards get free non-preferred seating for the cardholder and anyone on their reservation on any fare, plus a limited number of comped upgrades to either preferred (for the mid-tier card) or extra legroom (for the top-fier card). Given that there will be more than 15 extra legroom seats on every plane, hopefully both extra legroom prices will be lower than A1-15 day-of, and the top tier card will get 5-6 passes rather than the 4 it gets now.
All things considered, I give it better than even odds that I keep my WN card, as it pays for itself in basically one round-trip per year, and flying AUS-ATL at least once a year basically guarantees I’ll get my money’s worth.
Can’t wait to be seated in 3C and someone with C3 boarding but 26E seat assignment is going to argue.
Definitely a reason to pick the right side of the plane this year.
I’ve seen a proposal for the EML 737-737-700NG.
Forward EML rows 1-4 (24 total)
Row one will have 33 inches of leg room.
Rows 2-4 will have 34 inches of leg rooms.
They are removing row 15 to accommodate for the
Mid Cabin EML Rows 12-14.
On aircraft left. Row 12A is EML
(16 Seats Total) these will have 36 inches of
Leg room.
Only the Head rest on the 737-700NG and the Old seats on the 737-800NG EML will Don a New light Blue cover.
I’m actually impressed on the Fleet Balance restructuring with the 737-700NG retirements being put on hold until after 2028.
This new MAX8 and eventually MAX7 delivery will now replace the first 180 737-800NG including the First ETOPS aircraft. Eliminating the costly complete cabin refresh of the entire interior as originally planned.
Instead due to softening trends and an empty 2nd hand 737 marked WN will now sale these relatively young aircraft at a higher price to generate more profits.
This plan is a Win Win in my book. The question is will it be a Win Win in Elliot’s book.
They only down side as the fleet transformation finishes before the planned November-December 2025 holiday travel season until the switch over happens the Buy Cheap ask for Pre Boarding Scammers will most likely triple the pre boarders.
1. This 36″ pitch option is still about the best thing anyone’s had to say about the -700s in a good long while.
2. There’s actually so much blue it begs the question: How was David Neeleman so deeply involved with this project and nobody found out?!
What happens if I but a ticket BEFORE 7/1/25 for a 2026 flight (when the open seat system is still in effect). Will SWA seat me at their discretion? Will I get to eject some later purchaser from their selected seat? Or will SWA not sell any 2026 tickets until 7-1-25?
Ken – My understanding is they won’t be selling the travel dates that have assigned seating until they are ready to start taking bookings. It will be a hard cutover. But the exact dates are not firm yet.
Some thoughts and questions after reading the Investor Presentation and these CF blogs and threads:
1. There is much research on Consumers and Colors and Blue is at or near the top of the list of what consumers LUV (pun intended!)
2. I didn’t see any financial estimates on Assigned Seats other than the survey results, but this seams to expand TAM and thus Revenue$?
3. Seems like this makes WN more competitive vs AA, especially as AA has a Southern Focus?
4. Does WN need to upgrade its IT Team to implement these initiatives at it seems like this is an area they are behind but did not provide commentary on?
5. Does adding this many Premium Seats lead to increased pricing pressure across the market, especially the Big3?
6. What is the WN overlap with other “challenged carriers” such as NK, F9, and B6….all of whom are “enhancing their cabin and policies” too?
7. Speaking from my SoCal Locale, WN has large positions at both LGB and SNA and will now be offering a better product on direct flights to most nearby large metros.
8. Kudos to the WN Management Team for keeping many-to-most of their differentiators (see p15)
9. Fingers crossed that Boeing can uncluster themselves and fund a NMA that enables easy transition (low/no training) from B737 and is cockpit compatible (low/no training) with B787 so that LCCs can easily add in B787-based International Service! Leverage is the key to any complex electro-mechanical product, so hoping that B787 technology gets cost-reduced and volume-enhanced and put into a NMA project.
LaxLgbSnaFlier – I’ll answer what I know.
2) Page 83 of the presentation has the seating revenue expectations
3) Definitely, there is more overlap with American in those areas for sure
4) They’ve been actively upgrading their IT team. Whether it needs to be upgraded even more, no idea.
5) Possibly, but often people do this as a purchase after the fact so it’s not necessarily going to feel that pricing pressure. One thing to keep in mind, on the majority of the fleet, there is no lost seat count. So even a little extra money is gravy.
Until the assigned seating kicks in, I don’t think there will be numerous premium seats for A1-A15 to enjoy. Other than first flights in A.M. and the few originating daytime flights, passengers onboard continuing flights would be expected to scramble into premium seats vacated by those disembarking.
This is the utimate in fixing something that isn’t broken except in the eyes of a big stockholder who will be gone and forgotten by the time the seats hit the fan.
It’s “broken” if they aren’t doing everything possible to maximize revenue.
Over half of the extra legroom seats will be at or behind the exit rows! They are likely trying to provide some sort of perceived value to their “preferred” seating; however, in doing so they devalue over half of their extra legroom seats, i.e., the REAL preferred seating! Will the aft extra legroom seats cost less than the forward ones?
CF – did they provide any insight about this very unorthodox decision?
Bill – I think it’s really just math. The exit creates a hard block on where that row of seats has to be. So, if Southwest wants to keep the same number of seats on the airplane, it has to think of those as two separate cabins. It has finite space to work with in front of the exit and behind the exit.
So with that, Southwest’s options were to either just have an extra legroom section in the forward cabin which would have gotten 38 seats or it could have added another 30 behind the exit. The incentive is there to do it behind the exit as well, because otherwise you’d have 32″ pitch behind the wing as they do today which would make it less appealing to pay for extra legroom.
Understood. Thanks as always!
For Companion pass holders, wonder if they’ll be assigned a seat with their companion.
“There is more blue in the carpet design as well. Add in the cool blue mood lighting, and it’s just all so blue….”
Sounds like a lot of the domestic airlines these days.
Pretty much like what Gol (G3) did back in the day, when they introduced “Gol+”. The aircraft’s with the extra legroom seats, wore a “+” next to the Gol word, in the previous livery version. ;)
I sorta wished you’d replace all your references of ‘regular’ seating, to ‘standard’ seating, since that’s what it’s referred to on the seating configuration graphic. But yes, I realize I’m being a tad ‘extra’ here. Otherwise, great information!!