Airline Review: Air Berlin

Airline Review: Air Berlin -

Many, many years ago, I caught a cheap flight from Berlin to Bangkok on a carrier called Air Berlin. It was a joyless experience. At that time, Air Berlin was a low-cost airline that offered people to fly the absolute minimum internationally. She had bought only if you (or brought) an uncomfortable seat, no movies and food. The nine hours Bangkok were hell, especially since it was before I discovered the wonders of Ambien.

But has grown over the years, Air Berlin. It is now flying new aircraft, offer more in-flight services (they even introduced lie-flat business class seating), and have joined Oneworld my favorite airline alliance. They are no longer a cheap airline but a large and expanding players.

Over the past year I've heard good things from fellow travelers, so on my last trip to Europe, I decided to fly Air Berlin. I wanted to see how much has changed the airline since I flew all those years ago. Since I was flying on this journey through Berlin, it made sense.

My thoughts? Three out of four stars. I liked flying Air Berlin and prefer them to vie Lufthansa, which I flew in December to Africa. Lufthansa harder seats, worse food, and a very terrible movie selection.

Air Berlin has a fleet of 134 aircraft with an average age of five years, so that the planes are fairly new and comfortable inside. They are not the old pieces of junk that many American airlines fly (I look forward to you, United, US Airways and American!). The interiors are comfortable and clean, the seat cushion thick, there is plenty of leg room, and all the seats have individual screens on which to see a very robust film selection. (Movie Reviews: Cloud Atlas sucks, Life of Pi was wonderful, and Broken City was average.)

The food, while impressive in Business Class (quinoa salad, shrimp and delicious beef!), has been lacking in the industry. Was it awful? No, but it was good? No, it's exactly what you expect of airline food. The chicken was not taste as good, the potatoes had an ... interesting consistency, and the portions were a little on the small side. It felt like to get a school lunch.

See? That's not so bad looks, right? But it is not surprising, either.

I was disappointed that there were no electrical outlets in the economy, but USB ports were available, so I could still charge my phone.

While I enjoyed Berlin Air Service, my experience with their low-cost carriers, Air Niki, were hell. My connecting flights (two of them) to Lisbon were on a Niki Air plane, and I can honestly say they were pure crap. I mean, look at the photo:

My bag can not even under the seat! And it's just a normal backpack! I had such a terrible time on this flight that I even United Niki Air might prefer - and you all know how I feel about United

In addition, when I sat down, there was soda all over my seat. . I have the flight attendants, but they just looked at me and said. "Well, clean it," I was sitting in another seat down, and they came by, at the soda a bit spotted, grimaced and walked away .

Maybe I found them on a bad day, but even if they had been very friendly, the wear on the plane plus the extremely small room sat back from flying off. Niki receives complaints to an extreme

If you want to book with Air Berlin, make sure to see that operates the aircraft, so that you avoid Niki Air

Overall I like - .. But do not love - Air Berlin. I would much rather fly with them, though, as the other major German carrier Lufthansa. Since I'm part of Oneworld (I'm a fanboy American Airlines), the fact that this airline part of this alliance it means is that I'll probably end up soon on another of their flights and also be completely satisfied.

There are many blow-your-mind airlines in the world, but I measure to an airline through a specific checklist every time: good movie selection, nice staff, modern aircraft, comfort and food. If you checked off to get me from point A to point B with most of these boxes, I'll fly again

Air Berlin, for all the grounds on my checklist - plus your flights to Europe, which are hundreds. of dollars cheaper than most of your competitors (including alliance partners such as American Airlines and British Airways) - I'll fly again
Editor's Note :. I met the Air Berlin team at a direct in New York City traveling, and when they heard I went to Europe, they offered to pay for my flight and from Europe. I accepted because I wanted to try it again.

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