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American Airlines operates several variants of the Airbus A321 and as far as I can tell, it offers these aircraft in at least four different cabin layouts. The A321 that I flew on between Dallas/Ft. Worth and Palm Springs was a 23-year-old aircraft that once flew in US Airlines livery.
Leading up to this flight, I had flown across the Atlantic and spent a lot more time than I had planned in the American Airlines DFW Flagship Lounge (thanks to a schedule change and American Airlines’ inability to recover from bad weather in any kind of timely manner), so when I finally boarded the aircraft, I was more than ready to be on my way.
Cabin layout
On this American Airlines A321, the First Class cabin offers 20 Collins Aerospace MiQ cradle seats, arranged in a 2-2 configuration across 5 rows.
The seats
The seats in this First Class cabin are American’s Project Oasis 2.0 seats that first appeared in 2020 and which replaced a truly atrocious product that the airline had introduced just three years prior.
These seats feature a little more padding than the seats they replaced, and they offer a six-way adjustable headrest, a little under 37″ of pitch (legroom), 20″ of width, and 5″ of recline.
For reference, that’s a little less pitch and recline than you’ll find in most transatlantic Premium Economy cabins, but more width.
As with most American Airlines short-haul aircraft, you won’t find any inflight entertainment screens on this aircraft so, when seated, you’ll find yourself looking at a safety card and an table holder.
For all seats other than the seats in row 1, part of the center section of the seats ahead opens into a small drinks table.
And the space under the seats ahead offers a good amount of storage space.
You’ll find more storage space in the form of a magazine pouch attached to the back of the seat ahead which is sturdy enough to hold a tablet or laptop without collapsing outwards …
… and more space to store items close to you can be found in the center armrest.
This space isn’t large enough to hold most laptops, but there’s room for small tablets and smartphones.
It’s in this storage space, hidden away in the armrest, that you’ll find the seat’s universal AC power supply.
For anyone wishing to charge one of their smaller devices, the USB-A port found on the seat ahead should do the job.
Note: The seats in row 1 do not have access to USB-A ports.
The seat’s tray table can be deployed from the aisle-side or window-side armrest (depending on which seat you’re in) …
…and can be partially opened …
…or fully opened depending on your needs …
… and while it’s far from the sturdiest tray-table you’ll come across, it’s rigid enough to make for a reasonable (if small) workspace).
The last thing to note from the area around the seat is that passengers have access to overhead lights as well as overheadd air nozzles, with the latter being especially important for those times when the crew decides the cabin temperature should be set to “broil”.
Overall and for the 2.5 hour flight to Palm Springs, the seat was comfortable enough.
By short-haul standards, it offers plenty of personal space and plenty of storage space (the absence of IFE onboard means that there are no electronic boxes under the seats to limit legroom or storage space), and most people don’t really need much more than that for a flight that’s not crossing an ocean.
Entertainment and wifi
As already mentioned, the A321 doesn’t offer an inflight entertainment screen, but passengers who have downloaded the American Airlines app before departure can connect to American’s entertainment system through the in-flight wifi for free.
As the information will probably be out of date when you’re reading this, I’m not going to list out what entertainment American was offering on this flight, but you can see what shows and movies are playing onboard right now by visiting this American Airlines webpage.
The A321 offers ViaSat KA-band satellite wifi which is considered to be the fastest available wifi that American Airlines offers and can be used to stream content (when the system isn’t overloaded).
The service
There was just one member of cabin crew serving the 20 passengers seated in the First Class cabin.
Pre-departure beverages were not served and due to turbulence, hot nuts and drinks were not served until 50 minutes after take-off.
The meal was served shortly after with a choice of chicken Parmesan with cheesy pasta or a quinoa salad accompanied by a small mozzarella salad and a slice of cheesecake.
I chose the chicken.
The chicken was fine if unremarkable, the pasta was ok (it’s hard to ruin pasta served at 30,000 ft.), the mozzarella salad was small but fresh-tasting, and while the cheesecake clearly contained more additives and preservatives than a face in Beverly Hills, it still, somehow, managed to taste quite nice.
The fact is that no one pays for American Airlines domestic First Class in anticipation of fine dining (I probably could have omitted the word ‘domestic’ from that sentence), so what was served wasn’t really much of a surprise.
Was it great? No.
Was it memorable? No.
Was it edible? Yes.
Is that all I hope to get from a domestic First Class flight nowadays? Sadly, yes.
I can’t really say that the food on this flight was anything more than average, but given the swill that I’ve seen reported by others flying in domestic First Class cabins (across all carriers), ‘average’ is probably the best I could have hoped for.
The service, however, was not average.
Yes, pre departure beverages were not served, but other than that it was hard to find fault with the flight attendant assigned to the First Class cabin.
I actually felt really sorry for him having to do everything by himself for a cabin of 20 people, but despite this, he did his job with a smile and, seemingly, with an interest in doing it as well as circumstances would allow.
I have absolutely no complaints about the service on this flight, and as this was my second American Airlines flight of the day on which the crew was great, I have since begun to question my scepticism of miracles.
Overall
For the 2.5 hour flight between Dallas/Fort Worth and Palm Springs, the First Class cabin and on this American Airlines Airbus A321 was fine.
The seat was comfortable enough, I had plenty of legroom, I had some control over the temperature of the air around my seat, and there was enough storage to store items that I wanted close by and, frankly, that’s all I really need from a short-haul First Class seat.
The food was very average but edible, and as disappointing as this may be to read, that has to go in the win column when discussing food on domestic short-haul flights.
The service onboard was hampered by turbulence towards the beginning of the flight, but the cabin’s only flight attendant was very personable, and I felt for him having to deal with a full 20-seat cabin on his own. That didn’t seem right.
Overall, an acceptable flight that didn’t really stand out in any way at all (good or bad).
All reviews in this series:
Review: American Airlines 777-300ER Business Class (transatlantic)
Review: American Airlines Flagship Lounge at Dallas/Fort Worth (DFW)
Review: American Airlines A321 domestic First Class (DFW-PSP)
Review: Marriott Desert Springs Villas I (a Marriott Vacation Club property)
Review: American Eagle CRJ-700ER First Class (PSP-PHX)
Review: Escape Lounge Phoenix (PHX) Terminal 4
Review: American Airlines 777-200ER Business Class (transatlantic)
Review: Iberia short-haul Business Class A320neo (LHR-MAD)
Review: Iberia Premium Lounge Velazquez Madrid Terminal 4S
Review: Iberia short-haul Economy Class A320neo (MAD-LHR)
If you know the name of the crew member who provided such great service, could you give him credit? Perhaps someone at AA would notice or maybe he himself?
Unfortunately I don’t know his name. A day of traveling (including a transatlantic flight) meant that I wasn’t at my sharpest by the time this flight came around, so it didn’t occur to me to note the FA’s name down. I wish I had.