Virgin Atlantic Boeing 787-9 Upper Class Review [LHR to BLR]

Key Takeaways

• While most of Virgin Atlantic’s Upper Class seats are among the best, the Upper Class cabin on its Boeing 787s is not up to the rest of the fleet.
• Despite the subpar seat, the food, entertainment, and service on this flight were all excellent.
• The ground experience in London included the Virgin Atlantic Clubhouse, a world-class airport lounge.

Airline: Virgin Atlantic (VS)
Aircraft: Boeing 787-9
Flight #: VS316
Route: London Heathrow Airport (LHR) to Kempegowda International Airport (BLR)
Date: October 27, 2024
Duration: 9 hours, 36 minutes
Cabin and Layout: Virgin Atlantic Upper Class, 1-1-1
Seat: 9K
Cost: $2,571 (round-trip New York to Bengaluru via London)

Virgin Atlantic offers many flights from the U.S. to its hub in London. Its business class, which the airline calls Upper Class, is among the better ways to cross the ocean.

There’s only 1 issue: Some of those flights are operated with the Boeing 787-9, which features the least competitive of Virgin Atlantic’s Upper Class seats. Introduced in 2014, it offers less privacy than rival products and is showing its age.

How does this oldest iteration of Virgin Atlantic’s Upper Class hold up against its more modern competition, including from the airline’s own newer cabins?

To answer, we put the Boeing 787’s Upper Class to the test on a long flight from London to Bengaluru, India. Read on for a detailed review.

Booking Virgin Atlantic Upper Class

This flight was part of a round trip from New York (JFK) to Bengaluru (BLR), connecting both ways through Virgin Atlantic’s base at London Heathrow (LHR).

While most passengers heading to the Indian subcontinent from the Americas connect on the Big 3 Middle Eastern carriers — Emirates, Etihad, and Qatar Airways — via their global megahubs in the Gulf, Virgin is an attractive choice thanks to its excellent service and competitive pricing.

I paid $2,571 for the round-trip flight using the Chase Sapphire Reserve^®, which earns 4x points on airlines booked direct.

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I credited the flight to Delta Air Lines SkyMiles; Delta is Virgin’s close partner and owner of 49% of the British airline. The Medallion Qualification Dollars earned on this round-trip were more than enough to renew my Diamond Medallion Status with Delta for another year.

Virgin’s London-to-Bengaluru route can also be exceptionally cheap on points. Virgin Atlantic’s Reward Seat Checker shows that in April 2025, you could pay as few as 23,000 points (plus $481 in taxes and fees) for a one-way award in Upper Class. On some dates, that is even cheaper than economy class!

Hot Tip:

Virgin Atlantic points are easy to come by, thanks to a variety of transfer partners. If you don’t have any or need to top off your account, Virgin Atlantic Flying Club is a transfer partner with 7 major transferable currencies: American Express Membership Rewards, Bilt Rewards, Capital One miles, Chase Ultimate Rewards, Citi ThankYou Rewards, Marriott Bonvoy, and Wells Fargo Rewards.

London Heathrow Airport

Virgin Atlantic’s Upper Class passengers departing from London can check in and clear security through the exclusive Upper Class Wing at Heathrow’s Terminal 3.

I was coming from New York — aboard Virgin’s very good Upper Class on the Airbus A330-900 — and spent the hours between my flights at the Virgin Atlantic Clubhouse. I had an extremely comfortable 5-hour layover. If you’re connecting through Heathrow on Virgin or Delta, try to schedule enough time to enjoy the lounge without having to rush.

Virgin Atlantic’s flagship lounge has long been a favorite of frequent flyers, and my visit confirmed its status. The space was well-lit and beautifully furnished, the food was top-notch, and noise levels were never annoying. Overall, the wait for my connection was a pleasure.

If you use the Clubhouse, though, be advised that Heathrow’s Terminal 3 is sprawling and that walking to your departure gate could take as much as 20 minutes. If in doubt, ask Virgin’s staff at the lounge desk how long it’ll take you to reach the gate.

On Board Virgin Atlantic’s Boeing 787-9

Identified by the British registration G-VWHO and named Mystery Girl — because Virgin Atlantic names all of its planes after women — the 787 waiting at the gate was a 2015 model, delivered new to Virgin from the Boeing assembly line in Everett, Washington.

Virgin’s highly professional ground staff did a good job of managing several pushy, unruly passengers who weren’t respecting the boarding order, and we left the gate on time at 11:57 a.m.

Upper Class Cabin and Seat

Boarding through the minilounge at the back of Upper Class, lit in the airline’s signature purple, immediately gave a sense of spaciousness. This area would be used during the flight for socializing, chatting, and having a snack or a drink.

At first blush, the Upper Class cabin on the 787 was a beauty. I might even have felt like I was looking at the sleeping pods on a spaceship.

Their sci-fi charm, however, was pretty much all that those seats had going for them. The biggest problem was that they did not provide privacy because of the peculiar, angled layout known as “herringbone” (as opposed to reverse herringbone, where the seats face the windows rather than the aisles, as was the case here) and low dividers.

I counted only 17 passengers in business out of 31 seats, and those around mine were unoccupied, so I did not have to stare at strangers for hours. On a packed flight, things might have been awkward.

If it’s privacy you’re after, the best seats in the house are 1A and 1K, where you won’t be looking at anyone else. If you’re taller than a small child, however, someone will be looking at you over the divider.

I was in 9K, third from the aft bulkhead. Thanks to the half-empty cabin and great service, I had a lovely time, but I would not want to have dropped my hard-earned points or cash for this seat on a full flight.

To my left, I had a set of simple seat controls. Going fully flat, though, was a more complicated operation, and some passengers required help from the crew to figure it out.

The retractable shelf, under a reading light, was handy but unsuitable for storing anything that you didn’t want to risk losing under the seat.

The monitor, right next to it, was the clearest indication that this seat was straight from 2014 when Virgin began flying 787s. In technology, 10 years is an eternity, and the monitor’s small size, slow response, and low resolution made it feel painfully dated.

The saving grace of the tiny monitor was that, once extended, it acted as a small privacy screen.

Had other passengers been sitting across from me, that monitor would have been the only barrier between me and them. This would not have been an issue in economy class, but it would’ve been when paying or using points for Upper Class.

Another issue with the seat was that the table and monitor could not be used together. To eat and watch something at the same time, I had to turn my head to the side to see the monitor.

An even more uncomfortable movement was the head turn required to look out the window.

The only other major airline flying the same seat today is Air New Zealand. Our 2023 review of Air New Zealand’s business class found that “seats are incredibly narrow, offer almost no privacy, storage is minimal, and to see out the windows you have to crane your neck.” No wonder the Kiwis are ditching this product for a new business class.

Cabin crew on my flight mentioned rumblings within the company of an impending cabin refurbishment. When we asked Virgin, the airline said it was, at least for now, just a rumor.

In bed mode, the seat was much better. A mattress pad — a rare treat even in business class — and a cozy comforter, plus the bed’s generous length and foot room, made for a few hours of real, sound sleep. The only thing that woke me was a fellow passenger speaking loudly at the bar.

Again, my experience would have been less positive if I’d had other passengers near me.

At least keeping my phone powered was easy, with a universal outlet by the small storage cubby and a USB-A charging port under the monitor.

Food and Beverages

Virgin Atlantic usually does food and beverages right, in my experience, and this flight was no exception. Service began with a predeparture beverage. My lemonade was one of several choices, with alcohol and without, that flight attendants offered on trays.

Like the onboard announcements, the menu was in English and Kannada, the language spoken most widely in the Indian state of Karnataka, of which Bengaluru is the capital. The menu included several Indian dishes, too.

Meal service consisted of an amuse-bouche after takeoff, then a 4-course lunch, and finally a lighter meal that wasn’t quite dinner or breakfast — which made sense, considering we would land in Bengaluru at 3 a.m. local time.

After takeoff, I was served a bowl of potato chips with a Coca-Cola. Then it was time to choose a starter and entree or, in my case, enjoy what I had preordered. You could make a selection online up to 24 hours before departure.

For the starter, the choices were:

• Curried cauliflower soup with spiced crispy onions and coriander oil
• Lemon and chili marinated prawns with baby gem lettuce, Marie Rose sauce, pickled celery, and avocado puree

And for the main dish, you could select from:

• Chicken and mushroom pie with a hint of truffle, mashed potatoes, roasted carrots, greens, and gravy
• Lamb dahwalla with tomato and coriander okra and paratha
• Vegetable korma with almond basmati rice, saag masala, and naan bread

For dessert, you could have:

• Dark chocolate and morello cherry delice with vanilla cream and blackberries
• Gulab jamun in syrup with chopped pistachios

And finally, you could ask for a plate of British cheeses with red onion chutney, grapes, and walnuts.

All this could be accompanied with wines from a smart, worldly wine list, the same I had just seen on my Virgin flight from New York to London the previous night.

I ate the pleasantly zingy, if tiny, prawn appetizer while looking on the monitor at pictures from my phone, which could be connected via USB to the onboard entertainment system.

The large chicken pot pie that followed more than made up for the appetizer’s small size. It did have the hint of truffle the menu promised.

I wasn’t sure I wanted dessert, but when I asked flight attendant Odette about the gulab jamun, she said it was “like a fried doughnut, but with rose water.” Sold!

When the gulab jamun arrived, it turned out not to be shaped like a doughnut at all, and with a distant trace of the promised rose water that had won me over — but it was delicious. It became the first of several I would have over the following days in India.

After lunch, with the cabin darkened and many passengers taking an extended afternoon nap, the crew put out snacks and soft drinks in the lounge.

Although the seats in Upper Class on the 787 may have been subpar, the spacious lounge and light passenger load helped to make this an enjoyable flight. I had plenty of room to stretch, and after almost 10 hours on board, I felt as fresh as one can reasonably expect after a long flight.

I woke up somewhere over the Arabian Sea, and when Odette noticed me sitting up, she came to ask if something from the selection of small plates was appealing. The choices were:

• Cinnamon scone with salted caramel cranberry and orange scone with lemon curd, served warm and with clotted cream
• Togarashi-spiced smoked halloumi burger with sesame, Little Gem lettuce in a brioche bun served with chipotle mayonnaise and salted crisps
• Indian tasting plate with vegetable samosa, vegetable pakora, and thoran salad, served with hot mango chutney
• British winter ploughman’s (chicken liver paté, Shropshire blue cheese, baby pear, pickled celery, and candied walnuts, served with a miniature baguette)

Getting the bed back to a sitting position and then back down for another nap would have been a chore, so when the Indian plate I had chosen arrived, I ate with the seat still in bed mode. It was awkward, but the food was good.

Inflight Entertainment

Virgin’s inflight entertainment system is among the best. Films on this flight catered to a very broad array of tastes and were broken down into several useful categories beyond the usual division by genre.

As I often do on Virgin, I ended up listening to the excellent music selections — this was, after all, an airline founded by a record company mogul — rather than watching films or TV shows. The monitor had a standard headphone jack, so I could plug in my own noise-canceling headphones. Those issued by the airline, found on every seat at boarding, weren’t as good.

You could also listen to your own music (in MP3 format, another throwback to an earlier era in technology) by connecting your phone to the monitor using the USB port. This allowed you to look at your phone photos on the monitor.

Wi-Fi was very fast, with a 58 Mbps download speed. A full-flight pass cost the equivalent of $17, and the system would not accept credit cards. After many tries, I managed to connect by selecting PayPal as a payment option.

Sadly, what could have been the best entertainment of all didn’t happen. We overflew Egypt at sunset, and my starboard seat might well have given me a direct look at the pyramids of Giza, according to the flight map. But the 787’s electronic windows, which don’t have pulldown shades, had all been darkened with a central switch that individual passengers cannot override.

Amenity Kit

Amenity kits were on the ottomans at every seat, the same as the kits on my previous flight. Inside, I found all the typical essentials in most business class kits, including creams and hydration lotions from British brand REN.

This was mostly a daytime flight, so the cabin crew did not offer pajamas to change into. They might have been available for passengers who asked.

Lavatory

Upper Class on the Virgin 787 has 2 bathrooms, 1 on each side. They are the same large size.

With only 17 passengers sharing them, there was never a wait, and both lavatories were kept spotless throughout.

Service

I’ve flown Virgin across the Atlantic and to Africa many times, but this was my first flight to Asia with the British carrier. Like on all those other flights, ground and cabin staff were affable and efficient.

Flight service manager Paul — who held the role other airlines call purser or chief flight attendant — came to my seat during boarding to introduce himself and the flight attendant who would be taking care of my aisle. Service flowed easily from takeoff to landing, meals were delivered and plates were removed speedily, and the cabin crew always interacted in a friendly manner.

In an example of great service, flight attendants offered to make beds for 2 elderly passengers in unoccupied seats, so they were able to use a seat for sitting and another next to it for sleeping at their leisure. That helped make the journey easier for everybody.

Arrival

Flying from Heathrow to Bengaluru normally takes less than the 9 1/2 hours we spent in the air, but we flew a longer route to avoid the airspace between Iraq and Iran for safety reasons. This added about 45 minutes to the average flight time, a crew member told me.

Virgin and most other airlines have since gone back to the more normal routing between Europe and South Asia, bisecting Türkiye and then heading south over the Gulf.

After disembarking at the big and modern Kempegowda International Airport in Bengaluru, I headed into town and the beautiful Taj West End hotel. Mystery Girl would spend just an hour on the ground being refueled, cleaned, and catered before heading back to London and then all over Virgin’s route map, from Johannesburg (JNB) to San Francisco (SFO).

Final Thoughts

If you paid or redeemed your points for Upper Class on a Virgin Atlantic Boeing 787, you might be disappointed by the seat — a problem shared by Virgin’s Airbus A330-300 jets, which have the same Upper Class cabin.

Virgin’s friendly service, stellar inflight entertainment, and customer experience on the ground are all world-class, but that seat just isn’t up to today’s best standards.

The 787 is otherwise a quiet airplane, with lower cabin altitude and less dry cabin air than the previous generation of jets. That reduces the dizziness and dryness you might otherwise experience on a long flight. But until Virgin’s 787s get new Upper Class seats, our recommendation is to avoid them, if possible, in favor of the airline’s vastly better other products.