KLM Royal Dutch Airlines

The worst experience ever with the "New ergonomically designed seats" on the flight from Sao Paulo to Amsterdam last week. Sitting in the window seat, I felt pressed to the wall, by the passenger next to me, a normally built man, who obviously needed more space. Whatever position I sat, resulted in contact with the passenger next to me. This was never a problem with the old, comfortable seats. They had plenty of space for normally built passengers. I attempted to sleep by standing for a couple of hours by the restrooms, but was not allowed by the flight attendant. I was told that the seat widths are the same as earlier on KLM aircraft, which seems to be incorrect, after reading the reviews on this site, where so many others are complaining about the narrow seat width.

The KLM Boeing 777-200 seats are the absolute worst imaginable. Narrow, uncomfortable and impossible to watch the inflight movie monitor with the front seat reclined. They have decided that even a minimum amount of comfort is too much in their effort to find ways to save costs. It doesn't matter how well they score on other points but I will not be flying with KLM anytime soon.

I flew from Johannesburg to Amsterdam on what can only be described as the most uncomfortable flight of my life. As a regular KLM customer for over 20 years and a current gold card holder I decided to upgrade to premium economy for the flight to ensure that I had a bit more comfort, how wrong I was. OK, I had a bit of legroom but the seats are far too narrow in the new 3x4x3 configuration. Whatever position I sat in resulted in contact with the passenger beside me (I was in a window seat), it was most uncomfortable, at the very least you expect to have some personal space when you fly economy "comfort". Sadly I will be avoiding this new layout whenever I can in future, I really enjoyed flying with KLM because being a gold card holder everything else is fantastic. Now I always look to fly with another airline within the Skyteam group of airlines, I have actually started my rewards programme with Star Alliance because of the narrow seats issue with KLM, I'm sure I'm not the only customer that is unhappy, So far I've flown 20 times with KLM this year (2016) and I have not booked any more flights. The best thing about the flight was the new entertainment screen and the crew, the cabin crew were also complaining bitterly about the new layout because it makes their job a lot harder. I can see KLM going back to 3x3x3 because a lot of people are complaining, I suggest that you look for other options before booking on a KLM aircraft with this layout!

A general note in regard to KLM's new updated Economy cabin. They have been promoting the new cabin and seats as an improvement, ergonomically better, etc. Fact is that the seats became more narrow, meaning a large group of people (in particular the Dutch who are generally taller) are crammed into the seat now. So instead of improvement, the comfort became much less and, as some say, feels like your on a low cost carrier airline. Generally very happy to fly KLM looking at quality of food and, for Dutch standards ok service. Cabin service improved a lot over the past years. Comfort unfortunately not, wich is sad considering many of the competing airlines of KLM score high in comfort.

The A330-300 leg room is short. The seat cannot recline much. The worst is that KLM put an electronic box under the seat to take away the last existing small leg room from me. KLM has no attention to provide the basic comfort to its passengers. From that electronic box, I do not feel KLM respect its passengers.

What a horrible experience! It is our first and last time to ever fly KLM. My husband is a very tall man (over 2m) so we will always book premium economy. In this case, KLM has named it "economy comfort" but there's nothing "comfort" about it. On our flight to Amsterdam from Hong Kong my husband couldn't actually fit/sit in the super narrow seats. How embarrassing. We travel frequently and this has never happened. Luckily, the purser upgraded him to business and promised to send an email warning them about our return journey in a week's time. But when we checked into our flight home to HK there was no record of this issue. In fact, once we were directed to the ticket counter to get some help, the woman there was incredibly rude, telling us it's our fault for not checking the seat width online (I guess assuming that an international carrier that offers "economy comfort" would be like every other international carrier we've flown was the wrong thing to do after all). She also said that the seat widths are the same on all other airlines which is factually incorrect. And after reading the reviews on this site, I've noticed that so many others have complained about the super narrow seat width. So now, we are at the gate, having been told my husband may not be able to fly home, and we've been forced to pay 700 Euros for him to get a seat in business class. We certainly can't afford to pay this price, but how else is he going to get home?! There are other smaller items I would complain about; however, I've written enough already. What a horrible horrible airline and a sad way to end what would have been a fantastic trip to Amsterdam for my husband's 40th birthday.

This plane had the "new" interior and it's horrible. Extremely cramped 3-4-3 layout, narrow seats but a little more legroom than in the A330-200 for example (probably due to the super thin seats). The ailes are so small I cannot walk straight without bumping into people so you have to walk somewhat sideways. After about 1 hour me and my GF both had a back ache. My healthy 27 year old back still hurts like hell more than 48 hours after the flight. I always saw KLM as one of the premium airlines. Well, after this not anymore.

KLM is one of many airlines that have introduced slim-line seats, meaning that the seats are much thinner, giving slightly more room for your knees, which is much a appreciated by a tall frequent flyer such as myself. However, KLM Economy Class still needs some improvement. The slim seats feel a bit hard, almost like riding on a citybus, and due to the cramped seat configuration of 3x4x3 you are not going to feel very comfortable unless you are very small or anorectic. I was seatead in 32D, one of the bulkhead seats, and my sleep was constantly interrupted by people bumping into my shoulder. At every meal-service I saw the poor cabin crew trying to get their trolly through the narrow corridor, which often resulted in bumping into seats (and people). It is a pity, because KLM is a good airline with a high level of customer service, but when you fly Economy on their 777 fleet, you feel that you are seated in a lost-cost carrier.

The Boeing 777-300 seat is pretty decent. Seat pitch was perfect, however the width of the seat isn't good because the aircraft seat configuration was 3-4-3 (ten in total, instead of nine). The seat recline is doing its work. Aisle access is pretty tight. IFE was annoying - remote is not responsive, the TV is not touchscreen, lack of music an films.

What KLM sells as its intra-Europe "business class" product is in essence a standard economy seat (about 17 inches wide) with (perhaps) an extra two or three inches of pitch (legroom), with the middle seat blocked, and all business seats located in the front of the cabin. KLM's approach is very similar to what British Airways sells on intra-Europe flights. Because the fare for KLM's business class is so much higher than standard economy, the forward business class area is nearly empty (out of 16 available seats, only 5 were filled) which provided plenty of room for carry-on bags. I found the seats odd with an irritating built-in recline. My back hurt after a 90-minute flight from AMS to ARN. An empty middle seat is nice, but not really worth the cost for a 60-90 minute flight. Given the price differential I am inclined to stick with SAS-Plus and trying to get an aisle seat.