ANA All Nippon Airways

NH11 Chicago to Tokyo March 16 2015. I flew in First Class from Chicago to Tokyo. The suites are excellent the plane is clean the flight attendants are nice and caring. There is no better first class product out there.

In all respects bar one my experience of flying with ANA was a perfectly adequate one. Both flights were taken in Business Class. The first was from Dusseldorf to Toyko Narita on a 787. The second was from Tokyo Haneda to London. In terms of cabin ambience seating and IFE both flights were fine. The ANA business class cabin interior feels a little sterile but the seats are comfortable with plenty of personal space and a decent sized IFE screen. The selection of IFE programming could have been more extensive but it was sufficient. Noise cancelling headphones were supplied on both flights. The amenity kit was also fine but didn't stand out. Cabin service was efficient but lacked finesse or genuine attention to detail. Serviceable is the best way I could describe it. The main issue however was the food. With both a Japanese and 'International' menu offered you might expect the latter to actually cater to an international clientele and on the outbound leg from Dusseldorf to Tokyo it did with an accessible selection of options appealing to a wide variety of tastes. However on the return journey departing from Haneda the ANA 'Connoiseurs' international menu was provided (along with the standard Japanese option). This offered an unappetising 'amuse bouche' involving bamboo shoots in apsic and herrings followed by an equally unappetising soyabean milk bavarois with sea urchin jellied asparagus and smoked scallops (all cold) with no other options available. Only the main course a combination of hamburger patty small piece of beef and egg plant in an unidentifiable sauce was even vaguely appealing. Unless you wanted 'tilefish' or a pasta option that sounded even less pleasant. I have no problem with airlines trying to make their food more interesting but when you have a captive audience stuck on-board for 12 hours trying to push the envelope with left-field combinations like soyabean milk bavarois and sea urchin is taking things too far. Especially when it is the only option. It might be something that would appeal to an adventurous diner in an expensive restaurant but not a tired hungry passenger on board a long flight where the food is being prepared in a small galley from pre- prepared ingredients. 30000 feet in the air is not the place for culinary experimentation. Add to that the fact that options for the second meal during what is a long flight were uninspiring to say the least (although more appetising and less avant garde) and for the first time in a long time I actually regretted not eating a proper meal before I boarded my flight. After 12 hours on board I arrived at my destination feeling pretty hungry. Was it enough to put me off flying ANA again. No but next time I will check the in-flight menu before departure and may stock up on snack food before I fly.

SIN-HND (787) HND-YVR (767) SFO-NRT(777-300ER) NRT-SIN (787). I must say I experience much better service with ANA compared to Singapore Airlines and Cathay Pacific. All legs of route services were immaculate. The only qualms I had is the 787 seats which is extremely uncomfortable for a 6-7 hours route flight. It makes it uncomfortable to sleep especially when you choose a red-eye flight. However both 767 and 777-300ER Route were great and comfortable. Adequate leg space. I will fly with them in the future.

CGK-NRT-SFO it was good flight. Friendly crew. Food not that great. Limited options. Nice interior. Overall worth it.

Flight 0267 Munich - Haneda Economy. Very good service very clean plane but terrible seats. Narrowest seat I have experienced on a long-haul flight. Tight seat pitch as well. Absolutely unsuitable for an 11 hour flight. With these tight seats ANA has gone from having one of the best economy classes in the industry to arguably having the most uncomfortable one. I will avoid ANA in the future and either use Lufthansa JAL or Finnair.

Flight NH801 Tokyo-Singapore. New 787. Excellent service. Great Japanese menu. Terrible seats. Extremely uncomfortable! Suitable for up 3 hours flight but not 8 hours trip. There seats are big mistake. I will try to avoid in future 787 on long routes.

The thing about ANA is they have a lot of old planes like this 767-300 that I'm flying today from Shanghai to Tokyo. However the planes are always very well maintained so that you end up feeling like you’re flying in a meticulously recrafted retro cabin. A timepiece! Which kind of has a charm of its own. On this 2:20 min flight they offered an International or Japanese cuisine for the meal. We love Japanese food so we ordered the Japanese meal. However the flight attendant proceeds to tell us that they have no Japanese meals. Business class was nearly empty. We were the first to be asked. Japanese airline no Japanese meal. Anyhow she did eventually find us two meals. I think the pilots were left with no food! They do have extremely polite service though.

Took ANA for FRA-HND-FRA. B787-8 and B777-300ER. Both flights were on time. Everything was excellent. The cabin crew was very friendly and caring. ANA is a very good airline and I'll fly with them again.

Haneda to Hiroshima on 787-8 was the best domestic flight I've had! Great terminal great ground and inflight service. Premium lounge at Haneda good but nothing to eat. But the onboard light meal was very good indeed. 787 was great. This screen requires me to review IFE but I didn't use it so ignore my score.

NRT-ITM. B767. Taking profit of their Yens10000 offer for any Star alliance arriving passenger I booked a 5.55pn connecting flight to ITM. Fortunately my UA flight was on time immigration luggage delivery and customs very fast so NH kindly anticipated my flight to ITM for the 5.10pm one w/o fine. Lucky was I as a sudden fog invaded NRT delaying everyone. (I discovered arriving at ITM that my planned flight had been cancelled). Anyway we stayed 2 hours in the 767 constantly informed with free refreshments and apologies.