Flight Review: ITA Airways A320neo Business Class
Flight#: AZ75 / AZ74
From: Rome-Fiumicino (FCO)
To: Barcelona (BCN)
(and back)
Flight time: 1h 40min
Aircraft: Airbus A320neo
This is the flight review of two short haul journeys I recently undertook as part of a longer itinerary that took me from Barcelona (BCN) to Dubai (DXB) and back by way of Rome-Fiumicino (FCO).
While the legs between Rome and Dubai and return were made on Premium Economy and Economy, ITA Airways was kind enough to upgrade me to business on the segments between Barcelona and Rome and viceversa. This also allow me to check out the Hangar lounge at Fiumicino airport.
Full disclosure: I paid the economy class fare, the upgrade to business was courtesy of ITA Airways. Opinions are all my own.
ITA Airways Hangar Lounge at Rome-Fiumicino Airport
Whenever possible, a business class review should include also the lounge experience. On this occasion it was the Hangar Lounge, which I had the chance to visit.
The Hangar Lounge which is one of two lounges ITA Airways has at its Rome-Fiumicino hub and it is the one for passengers traveling to destinations within the Schengen free travel area. There is another lounge for non-Schengen destinations that will be the object of another review shortly.
As we shall soon see, ITA Airways’ intra-European business class product is, like is the case of so many other European carriers, quite bare-bones in its “hard” aspects, so it relies quite a lot on aspects like the lounge experience to help differentiate it.
The Hangar lounge did, in fact, not disappoint! Let’s see what I liked the most…
The first thing that stands out is the amazing design. The Hangar lounge is, certainly, one of the most beautiful lounges I have visited, with a nice combination of colours and a truly elegant setup with some elements evocative in some way of art-déco aesthetics (or at least this is the feel I got).
I visited quite early in the morning, so the whole food offering was basically breakfast stuff: a broad selection of pastries, with also some (a bit less numerous) savoury options. I ignore how and how often do the food options change, I imagine that towards lunch and dinner time some more warm foods are added.
UPDATE: ITA Airways reached out on this point, to let me know that, indeed, the food offering at the Hangar Lounge changes throughout the day. Here is what you can eat depending on the time of the day you visit:
6:00 – 10:00 am: Breakfast (the one described here)
10:00 – 11:00 am: Pre-lunch with cold pasta and sandwiches
11:00 am – 2:00 pm: Lunch with a choice of warm food and pasta
5:00 – 7:00 pm: Aperitif time with warm pizza
7:00 – 9:30 pm: Dinner with a choice of warm food and pasta
Unlike in other lounges I have visited, there is no beverages self-service, but the waiters at the central bar will provide whatever you need (including a rather impressive list of cocktails, which I did not try since it was not even 8am!). Coffee is very good, as expected in Italy!
There are also different options to seat down or rest, including standard seats and tables, sofas and armchairs. I particularly liked these type of soft pods, which are super comfortable, almost like a big bed. I also liked the fact that there are plenty of electric sockets to recharge personal devices.
The bathrooms are modern, impeccably clean and also done in an elegant design.
There is also a good number of workspaces which offer a quite and private space if you need to work between flights. You can see how they look here.
Cabin and amenities
To be fair, and as mentioned earlier, the “hard” element of ITA’s short-haul business class product has little in the way of differentiation. This is quite common among European airlines (interestingly, the ITA’s A321neos, which do some more medium haul missions, are actually fitted with a proper three-class cabin, as we will see in the corresponding flight report).
So, onboard the A320neo ITA Airways business class cabin you will find essentially the same seats as in economy, just that in a segregated section and with the middle seat always left empty.
The seats themselves are pretty nice (as we’ll see in more detail in the A321neo economy class review) and they all have in-seat power, with both USB and C-ports.
Worth noting also the green cabin lighting (could this be the first time I see green cabin lighting?) very fitting to the airline’s Italian identity.
Unlike in the A321neo, they have no seatback screens, although the aircraft is equipped with inflight internet connectivity and a wireless IFE content platform with a broad selection of international and Italian films and series as well as a moving map, which you can access through your own portable device.
When it comes to the inflight internet connectivity. ITA Airways offers 30min of free messaging to all passengers (on platforms such as Whatsapp, Telegram and similar), but afterwards it is necessary to pay for data plans. No differences between Economy and Business Class here.
Food and drink
This is one of the “soft” elements through which ITA Airways can differentiate its intra-European business class offering.
Both my business class flights were quite early in the morning, so I got to experience breakfast only, but I must say this was excellent and well balanced in both cases.
We were also given a bottle of water upon boarding, but I think this is also the case in economy class, so hardly a differentiating element.
I have posted here below, a couple of snaps from both the BCN-FCO and FCO-BCN flights so that you can check out the type of food on offer. Pretty similar in both cases with some small differences, like the type of pastry on the plate.
The coffee, again, stood out and it is served in a proper ceramic cup.
Our Take
ITA Airways short-haul business class is aligned with the current European standard. That is, don’t expect an exuberantly luxurious cabin onboard flights that are less than 3 hours long.
Having said that, I give it good marks on the two aspects of the experience where ITA Airways strives to provide a more differentiated experience for the business class traveler: the lounge and the food.