British Airways have announced that Wi-Fi is now available on some of its long haul services. The plan is to roll out the service on 118 aircraft serving international destinations over the next two years.
Technological advances mean passengers will be able to stream content from providers such as Netflix while flying. This promises to transform the on board experience compared to flights with no connectivity.
Wi-Fi Pricing Compared
There are two plans at British Airways, one for browsing and one for streaming. These are further divided into blocks of one hour, four hours or the entire flight. An hour of browsing or streaming costs £4.99 and £7.99 respectively. Images provided with the press release seem to show £17.99 and £23.99 as the pricing for the four hours and entire flight.
In order to celebrate the introduction of the service, Visa is sponsoring the Wi-Fi for a limited time. This means all passengers will receive an hour of browsing or streaming for free.
No mention is made of a complimentary service for any British Airways passengers which means people paying a lot for a first class or business class ticket may be somewhat put out at the fact they will have to pay for their connectivity on board.
Club World London City
Internet connectivity is already available on British Airways all business class 32 seat Club World London City service. Unfortunately it is old technology and is pretty much slow and unusable.
Considering the exclusivity of this service, I am hopeful that the new upgrade will extend to this service. If any flight needed fast Internet service, it is this one.
Overall Thoughts
Just three aircraft are currently fitted with Wi-Fi at British Airways so your chances of getting one are slim right now. As mentioned before, it is being progressively introduced this year and next year so it will become more common as time passes.
Connectivity in flight is now becoming the standard on many carriers and it will continue to do so. What is interesting is how this will affect the currently installed seat back entertainment – will it stay or will it go?
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Images via British Airways.
Was a pleasant surprise to have Wifi on my flight from Heathrow to JFK last night on a 747. Couple of things. 1. It didn’t seem like you could transfer your WiFi activation between devices. I ran out of batteries on my ipad and then had to switch to the phone. But the wifi page did not allow me to use the previous activation. 2. Make sure your devices are sufficiently charged. My power plug at my seat did not work…
That’s an interesting one… I’ve never tried to move between devices before when I’ve been on flights with Wi-Fi. Though I imagine you can because they often ask you to give an e-mail address and create a password. Interesting! Shame about the in seat power being out of service – I always board flights with the expectation of no power, so I always make sure the devices are charged.
The most important question – how was the speed of the service? Great to hear from someone who has experienced it already, so thanks for taking the time to comment.
I elected to pay a bit extra for the streaming service. It was not really”streaming” speed. I could not get things like Amazon Video nor any video streaming service to work. It was fine for standard web pages. Even then, the service would drop at certain times.
I also took BA 002, which is the service from JFK to London City a few days earlier. Interestingly, there was no wifi on that flight. That aside, that flight was easily the best NY to London flight I have ever experienced. Boarding was complete in literally 10 min, service was good, and no lines at passport control in London. If they had reliable wifi on that flight, it would be my new go to flight for London.
I would be surprised if streaming worked well when crossing the Atlantic, but as long as the web works that’s fine with me. Whenever I’ve used the Wi-Fi on Qatar Airways and Aer Lingus it also has the issue of not being fast enough to stream and it also drops out from time to time.
The BA001 and BA002 are brilliant flights. I took the 001 and 004 a few years ago and you can’t beat it for convenience, service and speed. It’s the most chilled experience you can possibly have. They used to have connectivity on it but it was really poor. Hopefully they’ll upgrade to the new service and I can’t imagine why they wouldn’t. Cross fingers! I love those flights.
The only time I had streaming quality on an international flight was on a JAL flight from NY to Tokyo. Was able to slingbox the NFC playoffs from my apt in NY to my iPad. And this was over the Bering Straights just as we left Alaskan airspace! I dont know what JAL use but the WiFi was the best.
Wow, that’s pretty amazing!! I bet you were loving that. I have yet to fly JAL, they’re a oneworld airline that is high on my list to try as soon as possible. I’ve heard good things about them – for most of my life actually!