Site seeing: Check your airline’s seat

Published 11:15 pm Friday, June 27, 2008

It’s a wise man that knows his seat: I was on an Air France flight to India last year, and I got stuck in an economy-class seat where half the leg room was taken up by an immovable metal box. I wished I had checked out www.seatguru.com before I made my seat selection.

What’s hot, what’s not: Choose an airline, and you’ll get an alphabetical menu of the planes the airline flies. Each model shows a diagram of its interior. You’ll learn the seat pitch and width, and you’ll be able to instantly see which seats are the best based on a color code. Good seats are green; yellow seats have some issues, such as being too close to the bathrooms; red, you’re in trouble. Roll your mouse over the seat, and you’ll get a mini review and more information, such as whether it has a power outlet. SeatGuru also includes information about food service, pet policies and facilities for infants. It also has baggage rules. (It even mentioned American Airlines’ new $15 baggage charge for economy-class domestic flights.) But some foreign airlines that fly from the U.S. — China Airlines and Jet Airways, for example — are not listed, and some that have gone out of business this year — Aloha Airlines — are still listed.

Vani Rangachar, Los Angeles Times