Air New Zealand reveals new 777 business class

Passengers who glance across the aisle in Air New Zealand’s Boeing 777 business class will soon be looking at sliding doors instead of their neighbour’s socks, with the Kiwi carrier rolling out new Business Premier suites in 2027.

The extensive refit will see all seven of the big Boeings upgraded with business suites which are very different to those of the refreshed 787-9 Dreamliners.

Air New Zealand's new 777 business class, arriving from mid-2027.

And they’re a world away from AirNZ’s current 777 business class seat, which launched in 2005 – yes, more than 20 years ago – and sees most passengers facing one another across the aisle.

AirNZ's current 777 business class is more than 20 years old.

Here’s the top line on Air New Zealand’s next-gen Boeing 777 Business Premier suites:

• 44 seats across two cabins (same as the current seat count and layout)
• high walls and sliding privacy doors
• 18-inch touchscreens with Bluetooth audio connectivity
• AC, USB-A and USB-C power (but no wireless charging)

Frequent flyers will immediately recognise AirNZ’s new Boeing 777 business class as the Collins Aerospace Elevation platform, which debuted in 2019 as the British Airways Club Suite…

British Airways' Club Suite business class.

… and also flies on Malaysia Airlines’ Airbus A330neo fleet and Philippine Airlines’ A350-1000s.

Malaysia Airlines' A330neo business class.

That’s not a bad thing, as Elevation offers a solid mid-range business class experience.

With each seat angled away from the aisle and reclined into it high-walled pod, there’s a welcome degree of seclusion even before you reach for that sliding door.

Air New Zealand's second-gen 777 business class.

The sliding door is slightly shorter than the 1.15m walls, and in practice, the door itself achieves little in the way of actual privacy: it’s not as if anybody walking past can’t see straight down into your suite.

Instead, the door is more about blocking out the rest of the cabin when you’re trying to sleep, and otherwise defining your space to create a little cocoon above the clouds.

Close the door for a good night's sleep in BA's Club Suite.

The cramped confines of today’s 777 sleepers will be swapped for suites with ample personal space for working and relaxing.

The Elevation seat offers plenty of personal space.

One very convenient feature of Elevation: storage nooks built into the benchtop, as shown below in BA’s Club Suite.

The side shelf on BA's Club Suite business class contains hidden storage nooks.

They’re great for temporarily tucking away your smartphone, noise-cancelling earbuds, reading glasses, and pretty much anything else you’d like to keep close at hand.

This is also where you’ll find the AC and USB power outlets – with a cleverly-designed lid that allows room for cables to pass under it without pinching them, so you can use those devices while they’re charging.

Pop open the lid, hook up your cables, then close the lid again.

Or you can just plug your phone into the USB socket, leave it under the shelf and let it recharge while you sleep.

The main storage cubby in BA's Club Suite.

However, the 777s – which fly mainly to the US and Singapore, with some side-trips to Sydney and Melbourne – won’t feature any 787-style Business Premier Luxe suites.

Front-row Luxe suites will remain exclusive to the Boeing 787s.

As a result of the refit, Air New Zealand intends to be flying its 777s a bit longer, and will push their retirement into the next decade.

“The 777 is a great aircraft for us, but the interior is something that we needed to bring up to modern customer expectations,” Baden Smith, Air New Zealand’s General Manager of Strategy, Networks and Fleet, tells Executive Traveller.

“The original plan for disposing of those aircraft was probably late 2020s. This probably gives us the opportunity to fly them into the early 2030s.”

All 777s to be upgraded by December 2027

The first 777 will go under the knife in March 2027 and take wing in May; the remainder of the fleet will get their make-over across the back half of the year.

“The plan is to have this done and dusted by the end of next year,” Smith tells Executive Traveller with a degree of caution.

“Now I wouldn’t bet my house on it, because as you and I know, some things happen in aviation that you don't anticipate, but right now, that's the plan.”

The work will be carried out in Singapore by the same teams “which have been dealing with the 787 retrofit, so this is a well-drilled crew.”

It's not an AirNZ business class cabin without a bit of purple lighting.

The initial refurbishment will take a little longer than the rest – due not only to the need for the revamped aircraft to be certified by authorities, but “the installation team learns the quirks and tricks associated with it,” Smith shares.

“Subsequent aircraft (refits) go quicker because you get through the learning curve, then it becomes a lot simpler and we should be able to get into more of a metronomic process from that point forward.”

Added to this is that several other airlines are already flying the Collins Elevation model, whereas AirNZ’s 787s were the first and to date only planes with the Safran-designed Visa business class seat.

AirNZ's 787s rely on this bespoke Safran-designed Visa business class seat.

“One of the great things about taking a product like the Collins Elevation is that some of the little hurdles and trip-ups have been taken away from us.”

The three Boeing 777s previously flown by Cathay Pacific won’t be upgraded.

“We’ll just be focused on our own fleet,” Smith says.

“Those Cathay machines have served us very well over the last few years, but they don’t form part of our long-term fleet.”

The Dreamliner difference

Despite the Boeing 787s and 777s ending up with completely different business class seats, Smith believes they’ll be similar enough to deliver “a consistent product and seamless customer experience across our wide-body fleet.”

Of course, one area where the 777’s business class will outstrip that of the 787 is the presence of a proper suite door, instead of a small sliding plastic panel mounted on the shelf next to the aisle.

“The privacy door is an interesting one,” Smith ponders.

“I think a lot of customers will really enjoy having that, but there’s also customers that like an open, airy cabin.”

All Air New Zealand 787s will continue using Safran's Visa business class seat.

Smith’s team weighed up and ruled out installing the 787 business class seat on the 777.

“The product that we’ve got on our 787 was designed specifically for a 787, and the width of the aircraft defines the angle of the seat and how it links in with the seat in front of it and behind it,” he explains.

“With a 777 you’ve got a wider cabin” – an extra 15 inches or 38cm, in fact – “and it would have required an entire redesign of that seat to make it applicable to the extra width of the 777 cabin due to seat track widths, sidewall profiles and all sorts of things.”

The geometry of the Safran Visa seat was tailored specifically for the Boeing 787.

“After an intense review of all the products out there, as well as the potential to redesign the Safran Visa seat for the 777, we concluded we’d be in a much better place if we can get this to market quicker, which is something that we can do with the Collins Elevation.”

“And one of the reasons we’ve chosen this product for the 777 is the amount of similarity it has with the 787’s Safran Visa.”

A new 777 economy seat – and Starlink?

As part of the refurbishment program, the 777 will gain the same economy seats as the Boeing 787s.

The 777s are getting a refreshed version of the Boeing 787 economy seat.

To help while away those inflight hours will be a 13-inch 4K OLED video screen with Bluetooth audio and dual USB-C charging ports – and below the screen, a fold-out shelf with a device holder for your smartphone or tablet.

Economy gets Bluetooth audio, but premium economy does not.

The 16 Skycouch rows will remain, along with a bank of extra-legroom Economy Stretch seats at a 35-inch pitch (compared to the 31-32 inches of standard Economy).

Air New Zealand's innovative Skycouch turns three economy seats into a sofa-bed.

However, the current premium economy recliners aren’t being replaced, nor will there be any change to their inflight entertainment system: meaning premium economy will be the only cabin on the revamped 777s to lack Bluetooth audio streaming.

Could these 777s also roll out of the maintenance hangar with Starlink Wi-Fi, which the airline began trialling in mid-2025 on two domestic aircraft?

“That’s something that we’ve talked about,” Smith confirms, “but there’s still a little bit of work to be done to decide exactly what we’ll be doing there, so watch this space.”

Also read: The new Star Alliance lounges coming to New York JFK