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British Airways and Lufthansa have been charging Business Class users to pick their seats for a while now, so we knew it was only a matter of time before United's management flipped out that they were "leaving money on the table" and followed suit.  Plenty of sites are covering this latest enshittifcation , but long story short,  the new "Base" Polaris: includes 1 free checked bag instead of 2 requires you to pay to choose your seat has no ability to upgrade to the new Polaris Suite has United Club access, but no Polaris lounge access has no free ticket changes or refunds available We all know that this isn't going to magically create a cheap Polaris seat for those types who "just want a bed in the sky and don't want any of that other fancy stuff." While that's how this un-bundling is always presented -- "we're providing choices!" -- the reality is that the crappy new product will have the old price and you'll have to pay ...

JetBlue posted on their blog today that they're going to continue the race to the bottom and add Basic Economy. ( I predicted this would happen ). While this makes me sad, we've seen mountains of data that show most passengers won't pay extra for a nicer experience in the cabin. They haven't figured out all of the details yet, but it sounds like their messaging is going to be about letting people have JetBlue's superior experience for the same price as flying Spirit or Frontier. While I'm sure it'll be cheaper than JetBlue's regular fares, I've found that Basic Economy on the legacy carriers is still priced higher than flying an Ultra Low Cost Carrier. The unfortunate reality is that their existing customers will be getting a taste of that ULCC spirit when JetBlue finishes retrofitting all of their old A320 planes . Their industry-leading 34" seat pitch in Economy is dropping to 32", and they're shrinking the lavatories to accommo...

Everyone loves JetBlue's new Mint planes , but, as I've complained about in the past , their old A320s are looking a little long in the tooth. Well, they just announced the details of their coming refreshed interiors. UPDATE: TPG has a full review of a 'Phase 1' retrofitted plane The good news the seatback in-flight entertainment (IFE) screen is getting a lot bigger and HD they're installing their Fly-Fi free high-speed Wi-Fi  the IFE now supports multiple languages for audio tracks the IFE also has support for streaming video content all seats will have power and USB ports The bad news Regular economy seats are losing 2 full inches of seat pitch (though the slimmer seat materials might mitigate that a bit) Those slimmer seats will likely be less comfortable than the previous ones Galleys and lavatories are being moved so they can add 12 more seats to each plane My thoughts The new 32" seat pitch will still let them claim "...