a plane on the tarmac

How To Fly United’s New 787-10 Starting Early Next Year

Earlier this week Aaron posted that United would be the latest airline to take delivery of its first Boeing 787-10. Currently, Singapore Airlines is the only airline operating the 787-10. United is set to take delivery around mid December.  This isn’t United’s first 787 as they already have Boeing 787-8 and 787-9 aircraft in their fleet. They have 14 787-10 on order. These planes will have the highest capacity and shortest range of the 787 family.

a white airplane flying in the sky

It looks like United recently updated its scheduled from what was previously announced. We already knew that the plane will begin flying in January, daily from Newark (EWR) to Los Angeles (LAX) and will ramp up operations from there. I would anticipate further changes to the schedules as planes get closer to their delivery dates.

New schedule looks like:

  • Newark to Los Angeles daily from January 7, 2019 , and 2x daily from March 31, 2019
  • Newark to San Francisco 2x daily from February 14, 2019, and 3x daily from March 8, 2019

It is assumed that these planes will not be a permanent addition to the transcontinental fleet. Eventually they should be flying on international routes. While the 787-10 does have the shortest range of any other 787 it can still fly for nearly 7400 miles.

a seat on an airplane

The United’s 787-10 has a total of 318 seats. That breaks down to 44 business class seats, 21 premium economy seats, and 253 economy seats. This will be the first 787 plane to have a true Polaris business class seat and Premium Select (Premium Economy) seats. Sam recently flew on real United Polaris Business class, check out his review.

How to book a flight?

Saver level business class award availability really doesn’t exist and saver level economy award availability is limited on these flights. The best place to look for availability is directly on the United website. Limited award availability isn’t anything new and really doesn’t come as a surprise.

Don’t fear, there are affordable fares for these routes.

Cabin Fare
Business Class $559
Premium Select $227
Economy (Basic Economy) $127

In order to book into the Premium Select cabin, select a standard economy fare and then add-on the seat assignment. Premium Select is located in rows 20-22.

a screen shot of a plane

This represents an amazing opportunity for passengers as Premium Select seats are essentially domestic first class seats. Who doesn’t want to fly in a first class seat at economy pricing?

Do you plan on booking a flight on the new 787-10 flight?

Sam’s Travel Hacks

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a screenshot of a website

As a frequent flier, I recommend book flights and compare prices on Skyscanner and JustFly for the best deals on the internet. We have put together many useful travel tips and airfare promotions in my Smart Travel section to guide you travel in more luxury with lower price!