This post is actually a guest review from one of my best friends, Valerie Pietrasz. During my trip to the US, I ended up on three of the four biggest US carriers, so with this flight, I can now present the final one: Southwest. She took a Southwest Airlines flight from SFO to DEN (WN3802) at the (way too early) time of 6 am. Her aircraft (N8583Z) was a Boeing 737-800. Southwest operates an all 737 fleet, consisting primarily of 737-700s and 737-800s. They also have some (grounded) 737-8s and orders for over 270 more 737-7/8s. Southwest is a relatively unique airline in the US because they don’t use a hub-and-spoke model like the legacy carriers, but instead operate many point-to-point services, based around some large airports that they have a presence in (e.g. Oakland, Orlando, Denver) or some smaller, secondary airports in large cities (e.g. Dallas Love Field, Houston Hobby, or Chicago Midway airports). This aircraft, for example, was flying from SF to Denver to Indianapolis to Las Vegas to Santa Ana all on the same WN3802 flight number.
Southwest has a fleet of 734 aircraft but only 105 destinations. By comparison, American Airlines, the largest airline in the world, has a fleet of 867 mainline aircraft but around 350 destinations (incl. regional destinations). Southwest’s biggest draws (beyond price) are their flexible no-change fee policy (which the legacy carriers have now made permanent beyond the pandemic) and two free checked bags.
Valerie has never been one to spend a long time at the airport, and that’s equally true during COVID. She arrived at 4:50 am, which was apparently about 15 minutes earlier than she would’ve if she had been traveling alone. Southwest uses terminal 1 at SFO. The gate area has even been renovated relatively recently, which meant there were ample power ports available. Given that this was California, social distancing was adhered to relatively well unlike in Dallas. Southwest has an open seating boarding plan, which gives it one of the fastest boarding times among US carriers. Instead of getting a seat at checkin, one gets a position in the boarding queue. To aid with social distancing, they only let 10 people board at a time, in contrast to their usual 45, with the next 10 boarding after the jetway had cleared. Southwest isn’t explicitly blocking seats, but instead hasn’t been booking planes to full capacity. A flight attendant noted the flight had 90/170 seats taken. If the flight had been more than 2/3 full, Southwest would’ve sent an automated email.
Once on board, Valerie grabbed a window seat (she was ~34th onto the plane). Southwest is known for their friendly and fun flight attendant safety announcements. The flight attendant noted the path of the plane, and because of a quirk of the way that airplane vocabulary works, technically the SF – Santa Ana would be a “direct” (but obviously not “nonstop”) flight.
Because of the way Southwest fills the flights means that no one should have to sit next to a stranger on the flight, which Valerie found to be the case as well. She actually had the entire row to herself even! Valerie is not particularly tall, so she had plenty of legroom and space for her bag under the seat in front of her. Her seat was a typical economy seat, with 32” of pitch, which is one of the best available economy pitches in the US (and noticeably better than the 30” pitch typical in Europe). The seats on the plane seemed relatively new and were very clean, since this was the first flight of the day.
Because of the early morning flight, Valerie was treated to a really nice sunrise, once above the cloud layer that one would expect for a flight from San Francisco airport. Valerie normally sleeps through flights (especially early morning ones), but the face mask made it harder. A water and snack service was provided on board (same as on all their flights over 250 miles), with a brownie brittle and assorted cheesy snack mix. Southwest is not serving other drinks or alcohol on any flight. Southwest offers WiFi for in-flight entertainment (with free Whatsapp!), but often people- watching is on offer too. Valerie saw 3 animals on the plane, including a dog whose paws got washed in the bathroom sink.
The flight took a bit of a southerly route to get to Denver in order to land northward and touched down a couple minutes early.
In summary, Valerie’s Southwest experience was largely on par with other economy experiences in the US and Europe. Given that Southwest is a low-cost domestic carrier, no lounge would’ve been expected, but the refurbished gate area had great key amenities and felt fresh. The seats are typical economy seats but with one of the best pitches available for standard economy class in the US, likely due to the lack of an economy plus product (4/5). The flight attendants were friendly and funny, and they did a good job under the on-going circumstances (5/5), and the snack service is a bit more substantial than on some of their domestic competitors on comparable flights (e.g. American Airlines) (4/5). WiFi as IFE is standard on US aircraft, but the free messaging (on more than just T-Mobile) sets it apart a bit (4/5). Overall the flight gets a 17/20.
Southwest awards points based on the base fare, so Valerie received 294 points for her cheap, early morning fare. Southwest points have a set redemption value as well, so it’s a very straight forward program, for better or for worse.
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