United Will Block 2 Middle Seats On The A321XLR To Save On Flight Attendants And Create “Economy Plus Seats With Extra Elbow Room”
Earlier this year, United made headlines by announcing the Relax Row, which will be coming to all United 787s and most 777s starting early next year and rolling out over the next few years.
And United has now announced the launch of “Economy Plus Seats With Extra Elbow Room,” which are extra-legroom seats with a fixed tray table that blocks an empty middle seat.
That sounds better than business class on intra-Europe flights, which offers a blocked middle seat with standard legroom.
Alas, United is only going to have the seats in 1 row on the fleet of 50 A321XLRs that will arrive over the coming years. The plane will replace the 757 and operate transcontinental and on long and thin routes to Europe and South America. The plane will feature Starlink internet.
American’s A321XLR hasn’t proven to be very popular with travelers due to design flaws and configuration.
On American, the plane features 155 seats, consisting of 20 business class suites, 12 premium economy seats, 12 Main Cabin Extra seats, and 111 economy seats. All of the main cabin extra seats are exit row seats.
On United, the plane features 150 seats, consisting of 20 business class suites, 12 premium economy seats, 4 Economy Plus Seats with Extra Elbow Room, 32 traditional Economy Plus Seats, and 82 economy seats.
By offering a more comfortable configuration, United will also be able to save some dough. That’s because the FAA requires 1 flight attendant for every 50 passengers, so blocking off 2 seats means the airline will need fewer flight attendants. As the Polaris business class suites have doors, an extra flight attendant will be required, so that means the minimum staffing on United’s A321XLR will be 4 compared to 5 on American. United does note that on most international flights, it still plans on using 5 flight attendants due to the increased workload on those flights, but on domestic flights and some international flights, it will use just 4 flight attendants.
United is talking up the A321XLR a lot, and while it does have some nice features, it will still be a narrowbody plane flying internationally with herringbone business class seats angled away from the window. It will also have limited bathrooms, with 1 shared between the pilots and business class and 3 in the rear shared between premium economy and economy. It’s certainly better than American’s A321XLR, but it’s still not a plane that I’m going to try to fly on over a widebody.
Let’s zoooooom in on the all-new A321XLR with the United Elevated interior:
✨ Lie-flat United Polaris business class seats with all-aisle access
💺United Premium Plus seats with a retractable divider (for the first time on a single-aisle plane 💅)
💪 A row in Economy Plus will… pic.twitter.com/u9u1gvFA1V— United Airlines (@united) July 14, 2026
United said it will announce the cost to upgrade to Economy Plus Seats With Extra Elbow Room at a later date. Would you upgrade to it?
