In 2024, approximately 1 billion passengers departed from U.S. airports. Nearly a quarter of those travelers, about 236 million, experienced a flight delay or cancellation, according to a recent report from AirHelp, an air passenger rights company.
28.01.2025 - 20:33 / thepointsguy.com / Zach Griff / Andrew Nocella
For close to two years, it's been clear United Airlines wouldn't meet its original 2025 target to update all of its aircraft interiors with promised bells and whistles like seatback screens and large enough overhead bins to fit every passenger's rollaboard bag.
But after supply chain constraints slowed the so-called "United Next" cabin program early on, the Chicago-based carrier is reporting progress.
United finished 2024 nearly halfway done with retrofitting its jets, executives said last week.
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"With installation work moving quickly now, we expect to be at 75% [done] by the end of 2025," United chief commercial officer Andrew Nocella told analysts on the company's Jan. 22 earnings call.
United first announced the massive cabin overhaul program in 2021 alongside a historic order of new jets. Both initiatives have encountered delays in recent years, though, owing to global supply chain disruptions and aircraft delivery delays at Boeing and Airbus.
As early as spring 2023, TPG reported that United's plans to outfit its fleet with the new "signature interiors" would likely spill beyond the airline's original goal of 2025.
Even those delays, though, didn't stop the carrier from expanding its ambitious cabin overhaul plans to include parts of the United Express regional jet fleet.
Though the retrofit process has taken longer than originally planned, the changes are already producing clear benefits for passengers, with more and more updated jets carrying passengers today — including United's spiffy Airbus A321neo I toured last month in Washington.
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Another milestone United expects in 2025: By the end of the year, its planes will fly with 150,000 seatback screens across its fleet, Nocella told analysts last week.
That word came on the same day TPG's Zach Griff reported the carrier had recently outfitted its 300th jet with Bluetooth connectivity, allowing passengers to link their AirPods and other wireless headphones to the inflight entertainment systems.
Hundreds of additional United jets will get that technology as retrofit work on the airline's fleet continues — and as the airline receives new aircraft.
Speaking of Bluetooth, the technology is perhaps the latest front in what seems to be an escalating fight for the best inflight technology between United and Delta Air Lines, arguably its main domestic competitor.
You may recall, Delta this month announced it would follow in United's footsteps by expanding Bluetooth-capable seatback screens to a larger portion of its fleet (albeit a smaller expansion than what United
In 2024, approximately 1 billion passengers departed from U.S. airports. Nearly a quarter of those travelers, about 236 million, experienced a flight delay or cancellation, according to a recent report from AirHelp, an air passenger rights company.
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Like a lot of us, I often find myself fried from days spent staring at my computer screen and nights circling back to emails I haven't answered. So when I heard that the Sanctuary Beach Resort in Monterey Bay, California, offered a package known as the Burnout Recovery Journey, I had to try it. When I arrived, I was happy to find the kinds of treatments on the spa menu I've been seeing more and more of lately: science-based offerings like infrared light therapy, IV drips, and electromagnetic pulse therapy. My outstanding massage took place on something called a Pulsed Electromagnetic Field mat. I was grateful that the hotel offered signal-blocking phone bags for the ultimate unplugging experience. Then I realized the irony: I was treating my burnout with…more tech. One has to wonder: How did we get here?
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