Today is the first day of assigned seating on LUV. I have not flown Southwest in over 20 years but it is still kind of a sad day; no doubt it was well past time to make the change but it was one of the things that, for better or worse, made Southwest unique.

WSJ recently ranked them the best airline to fly in in 2025 they must be doing something right again

Flying tomorrow. Will see how it goes.

While I am hugely in favor of them going to assigned seats, I dont like that as an A- list (but not A Preferred anymore) I have go to back to the days of setting a reminder to go into the app sometime before the flight to get a seat. Its essentially the same as when non-AList would have to check in 24 hours beforehand for a boarding position.

Also, how was it in taking care of the hordes of preboarders cured by Jetway Jesus? Based on the SWA Reddit it sounds like its alot fewer, which is no shock

As far as "upgrades" go other than an exit aisle, what is available on the southwest flight? Seems to me like they do not have a first class or even a economy plus or anything like that like the other airlines.

lazuras_dc said:

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As far as "upgrades" go other than an exit aisle, what is available on the southwest flight? Seems to me like they do not have a first class or even a economy plus or anything like that like the other airlines.

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I believe the first 10+ rows or so have extended leg room... so they squeeze them in the back. AA does this also.

I flew 5D yesterday, had an empty seat between me and the window and it cost me $19 for the seat. I'm A-list.

One thing that sucks though is Southwest is definitely not the economy fare airline of old. It's often cheaper for me to fly AA than SWA on short, Texas-based routes.

Flew yesterday and today....A-List Preferred, flying on Basic Fare, overheard several flight attendants and pilots talking about how displeased many of the customers seemed the last few days.

Yesterday Jan 28 DAL- HOU
-Chose my seat 2-3 weeks ago, had aisle in extra leg room , open middle seat during the flight.
-slower loading time i think ( flight was only 50% full ) , i was group 2
-some rows had 3 people with middle seat being filled, other rows completely empty and they were not allowing movement to open seats.
-only served water , no other drinks or snacks...pretty sure they use to serve at least snacks on short flights, they claim anything under 251 miles is water only.

Today Jan29 HOU- DAL
- arrived early at airport and was looking to fly stand-by, nope, must arrive either 30 min or 1 hr early ( app had issues so i could do it from the app) , the next flight hadnt left and was still loading, flight had empty seats but gate agent stated they could not add me, i have jumped on hundreds of flights like this in the past with no problems.

- they added me to stand by list for the next flight 1.5 hours later, they cleared standby 30min before boarding and i still had group 2..problem is they do not allow you to choose your assigned seat with stand by, gate agent stated they could not make changes and so i got stuck in Row 7 middle seat....flight was about 70% full with open middle seats in extra leg room and window/ aisle seats in the back open...they would not allow movement.

-water service and no other drinks or snacks

SWA needs to make some significant changes, short of companion pass and for me not having to deal with DFW i see no reason to fly them, leg room is BS unless your 6'5" or taller, what i prefer is an open seat next to me or give me a first class option....

not super pleased with the new experience. Waiting on the SWA survey to hit my email, if not then complaint note headed their way.

CDub06 said:

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Flew BOI-PHX-HOU yesterday. Here's what I can report:


5. Like with United and other airlines, if you are A List, you're eligible for a free upgrade 48 hours in advance, so set your alarm for 48 hours ahead of time to see what seats are open.


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You mean upgrade to a first class seat like United? Does new SWA have first class seats? And on United you don't have to do anything, they just automatically put you in a first class seat if you clear the upgrade.
But if you mean to like an economy plus seat, gold or higher you don't have to wait as you can select one at booking.

I'm still going to miss the orderly boarding vs elbowing gate lice out of the way

Flew Hou to Dal a week before the changes and they only served water as well. That is not new.

Jock 07 said:

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CDub06 said:

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Flew BOI-PHX-HOU yesterday. Here's what I can report:


5. Like with United and other airlines, if you are A List, you're eligible for a free upgrade 48 hours in advance, so set your alarm for 48 hours ahead of time to see what seats are open.


.

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You mean upgrade to a first class seat like United? Does new SWA have first class seats? And on United you don't have to do anything, they just automatically put you in a first class seat if you clear the upgrade.
But if you mean to like an economy plus seat, gold or higher you don't have to wait as you can select one at booking.

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Sorry, I meant like on United, at Silver status you can book an economy fare and choose your basic seat. Then at check in, choose an available Economy Plus seat at no cost. (If you choose one at booking, you pay a premium)

It's similar on SWA. If you're A List or above, you can book a basic ticket, but then choose an extra leg room seat 48 hours in advance at no cost. (If you choose one at booking, you pay a premium)

Obviously, there's no First class upgrades for SWA, so there's not an upgrade list for that like United has.

Gotcha, was wondering if I missed something about SWA adding a first-class option with the new changes. I wonder if they ultimately go that route as well. I think I read somewhere recently that they're looking at getting into the lounge game. Being 6'8" and the inability to guarantee an extended leg room seat is one of the main reasons I've tried to avoid SWA in the past.

Change is painful but I think that LUVers will appreciate assigned seating once the kinks are worked out in a month or two.

ChoppinDs40 said:

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Flying tomorrow. Will see how it goes.

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I moved a flight from Monday to Wednesday. Had to pick a seat. Board in Groups 1- 8. My flight was empty so not the best test case.

CDub06 said:

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Flew BOI-PHX-HOU yesterday. Here's what I can report:

1. People are still confused about the boarding groups. Some lady was complaining that she was in a different boarding group than her family and was mad that they couldn't board with her. They're assigned seats, lady...

2. The boarding process is slower. I was boarding group 1 on both flights and it took forever to get seated because that first group is anyone in a "preferred" seat - whether it's aisle or window. So a lot of musical chairs. It didn't get any faster as the boarding groups progressed. Partly because...

3. A surprising number of people couldn't figure out where to sit. On my first flight, I saw three people have to move because they were in the wrong seats. Also, a guy asked me to move because he thought I was in his seat. I don't know why it's so hard, but I guess SWA passengers need to be trained on this.

4. Preferred seats get an extra snack (pistachios).

5. Like with United and other airlines, if you are A List, you're eligible for a free upgrade 48 hours in advance, so set your alarm for 48 hours ahead of time to see what seats are open.

6. The boarding group stanchions (is that the word?) were already gone in BOI and Hobby. The numbers have been removed from the ones in PHX, but they still stand as a relic of the past.

7. I've still not seen one of the new planes with the phone holders and upgraded seats.

I think that's all I have. It was fairly painless, but the SWA flyers need to get used to it. I'm still pissed that I have to pay to check my second bag though.



EDIT: Just got a notification from Robinhood that LUV just hit their 52 week high...

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I got a whiskey neat. They didn't charge me.

maroonpivo said:

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Flew Hou to Dal a week before the changes and they only served water as well. That is not new.

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Been around for months. There is zero service on flights less than 40-45 minutes. Water / coffee only for somewhere around 1 hour flights. I'm not sure how long you have to fly before full service is triggered. I've only flown them intra Texas since their service policy changed so haven't been on a plane long enough to see full service in some time.

Having to arrive an hour early to change to another flight kinda sucks. I used to have to fly to Dallas every Wednesday for a one hour meeting. I'd leave the house for Hobby for a 9am flight and if I missed it, I'd just hop on the next flight out the next gate over. I would try to time my arrival to just walk onto the plane from the garage. Was such a painless experience.

I flew my first assigned boarding flights yesterday (DAL-HOU-CRP). Here are my initial impressions:

- There are 4 fare classes and the cheapest fare class is the only one that doesn't get an assigned seat. For my flight, there was only a 1k point difference between that lowest class and next one up so it didn't make sense to me, personally, to not just buy a window seat so I went with the next one up from the Spirit Fare Class.

- I then paid $15 for Priority boarding mostly because I was hedging against the unknowns of the new process.

- "Priority" is it's own group on your boarding pass, however "Priority" was not displayed or mentioned at the gate during the boarding process. We went from Pre-Boards straight to Group 1. I would have assumed Priority was between those two but never mentioned so I just got in line with Group 1 and got on the plane. I assume this is just a missed thing with a new process and it will get corrected but that's confusing for flyers who aren't veteran travelers and likely even for veteran travelers. Why call it out as its own Group and then ignore it at the gate...

- The time it took to board DAL-HOU was the fastest boarding I've ever experienced on a SWA flight and I've flown them hundreds of times as my main carrier. And we had a 100% load factor. I'll be curious if they share any post go live time motion studies on old vs new process. Just one data point but still it was noticeably faster.

- Upon landing, our FA announced through PAX could get up and move around. This is not true and as soon as she said it I chalked it up to habit of announcing the old way which it was because they asked us to stay in our assigned seats once the connecting PAX were off the plane.

- HOU-CRP leg was probably only about 30% full. I talked to the FA for a bit while we are on ground in HOU and she showed me the app they had on their mobile device. The front 1/3 of the plane (extended leg room seats) was empty, the middle 1/3 was full, and the back 1/3 was empty. Which makes sense...HOU-CRP is only a 35-40 minute flight and it's pretty empty on a Saturday morning in January. Those of us flying to/from CRP enough would already know this and buy accordingly.

- For the 800s, I have to assume they are strategically blocking seats during booking to ensure proper weight and balance in the cabin on the 800s considering the CG issues with that plane. And then releasing those for sell as they achieve what they need there.

Overall, I call it a plus simply because we boarded so fast and got moving. If that is going to generally hold true and assuming they fix the Priority boarding group miss, then this process will largely be a win.

Still unknown to me is how they are going to handle plane swaps which are FREQUENT in HOU. About 50% of the time I fly CRP-HOU, we have a gate/plane swap. I don't know how they handle this with assigned seats unless they are doing everything they can now to keep the overall move intact with PAX going from CRP-HOU and from HOU-XXX. That removes some level of former flexibility they had with just dumping people on different flights leaving HOU though.

AgLA06 said:

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I still don't get this.

They aren't cheap anymore. Nothing differentiates them anymore. And now their loading times and on time percentage will just be the same as the rest.

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Agreed. And it seems the SWA credit card basically gives everyone A-List benefits.

The only reason I'm staying with SWA is that I have the companion pass until Dec 2027. We travel quite a bit so it makes it much cheaper for us. Otherwise I'd be on United, especially since my buddy just gifted me Gold Status. The timing till likely work out that I switch over after my CP expires, as my son will be in college and my wife and I will steady traveling overseas more often.

That's crazy that they let you stay on the plane for continuing flights (if I'm understanding you correctly), the other airlines got rid of that decades ago.

Ag CPA said:

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That's crazy that they let you stay on the plane for continuing flights (if I'm understanding you correctly), the other airlines got rid of that decades ago.

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Different type of network than all other carriers. It's point to point so there is zero reason to leave the plane if you are continuing on the same plane to next destination. Been an operational advantage since inception because it keeps them nimble and more efficient by reducing boarding times for getting the next leg loaded.

You can still leave the plane if you want to, but you will then have to reboard through the normal process which would be stupid to do unless you just desperately need to get off the plane for some reason.

Flown SW off and on for many years. For the most part, I was always able to check-in right as the 24-hour window opened and score a decent boarding position. It was definitely kind of a game, but I think I kind of liked the game.

Wife on her first SW flight of the new system today. Mine isn't until later this week.

She did say that preferred seats get better snack (pistachios), first snack/drink service, and more frequent check ins if you want more or another drink etc.

Ag CPA said:

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That's crazy that they let you stay on the plane for continuing flights (if I'm understanding you correctly), the other airlines got rid of that decades ago.

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In the 90s, I flew to Chicago quite a bit on business. I worked at a small place operating on a shoestring, so SW got a lot of the travel business.

At the time SW operated very much on a short-hop model. Flying Hobby to Chicago, there were typically stops in places like Tulsa and St. Louis with the very same flight/plane. Most people stayed on the plane for the continuing flight. What was nice was if you boarded at Houston with a crappy seat, after the people got off in Tulsa you could move to a better seat. But you had to wait for the flight attendants to do a head count first. Today it seems SW does not operate flights with such short hops.

That was also in the days when SW had rear-facing seats on the exit rows. I was once on a flight that was the last hop of a transcontinental flight with probably four different legs. There was a group in one seat of exit seats, I think people who did not know each other, who had been getting one drink each hop. By the last hop, they were good friends and having a great old time.

torrid said:

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Ag CPA said:

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That's crazy that they let you stay on the plane for continuing flights (if I'm understanding you correctly), the other airlines got rid of that decades ago.

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In the 90s, I flew to Chicago quite a bit on business. I worked at a small place operating on a shoestring, so SW got a lot of the travel business.

At the time SW operated very much on a short-hop model. Flying Hobby to Chicago, there were typically stops in places like Tulsa and St. Louis with the very same flight/plane. Most people stayed on the plane for the continuing flight. What was nice was if you boarded at Houston with a crappy seat, after the people got off in Tulsa you could move to a better seat. But you had to wait for the flight attendants to do a head count first. Today it seems SW does not operate flights with such short hops.

That was also in the days when SW had rear-facing seats on the exit rows. I was once on a flight that was the last hop of a transcontinental flight with probably four different legs. There was a group in one seat of exit seats, I think people who did not know each other, who had been getting one drink each hop. By the last hop, they were good friends and having a great old time.

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Although long haul flights have become a greater percentage of the mix, they absolutely still operate short haul flights all over the country.

Lounge row was fun going to LAS. You better be ready to party or be tolerant of one on that flight!

YouBet said:

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torrid said:

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Ag CPA said:

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That's crazy that they let you stay on the plane for continuing flights (if I'm understanding you correctly), the other airlines got rid of that decades ago.

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In the 90s, I flew to Chicago quite a bit on business. I worked at a small place operating on a shoestring, so SW got a lot of the travel business.

At the time SW operated very much on a short-hop model. Flying Hobby to Chicago, there were typically stops in places like Tulsa and St. Louis with the very same flight/plane. Most people stayed on the plane for the continuing flight. What was nice was if you boarded at Houston with a crappy seat, after the people got off in Tulsa you could move to a better seat. But you had to wait for the flight attendants to do a head count first. Today it seems SW does not operate flights with such short hops.

That was also in the days when SW had rear-facing seats on the exit rows. I was once on a flight that was the last hop of a transcontinental flight with probably four different legs. There was a group in one seat of exit seats, I think people who did not know each other, who had been getting one drink each hop. By the last hop, they were good friends and having a great old time.

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Although long haul flights have become a greater percentage of the mix, they absolutely still operate short haul flights all over the country.

Lounge row was fun going to LAS. You better be ready to party or be tolerant of one on that flight!

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Maybe my perspective is limited. I've been regularly flying RDU-Hobby for about ten years, but only that route on Southwest. They really cut back on the direct flights during and after the pandemic, so I frequently have to change planes somewhere.

torrid said:

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YouBet said:

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torrid said:

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Ag CPA said:

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That's crazy that they let you stay on the plane for continuing flights (if I'm understanding you correctly), the other airlines got rid of that decades ago.

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In the 90s, I flew to Chicago quite a bit on business. I worked at a small place operating on a shoestring, so SW got a lot of the travel business.

At the time SW operated very much on a short-hop model. Flying Hobby to Chicago, there were typically stops in places like Tulsa and St. Louis with the very same flight/plane. Most people stayed on the plane for the continuing flight. What was nice was if you boarded at Houston with a crappy seat, after the people got off in Tulsa you could move to a better seat. But you had to wait for the flight attendants to do a head count first. Today it seems SW does not operate flights with such short hops.

That was also in the days when SW had rear-facing seats on the exit rows. I was once on a flight that was the last hop of a transcontinental flight with probably four different legs. There was a group in one seat of exit seats, I think people who did not know each other, who had been getting one drink each hop. By the last hop, they were good friends and having a great old time.

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Although long haul flights have become a greater percentage of the mix, they absolutely still operate short haul flights all over the country.

Lounge row was fun going to LAS. You better be ready to party or be tolerant of one on that flight!

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Maybe my perspective is limited. I've been regularly flying RDU-Hobby for about ten years, but only that route on Southwest. They really cut back on the direct flights during and after the pandemic, so I frequently have to change planes somewhere.

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Yes, they certainly did cut back on some non-stops and directs. My current hometown airport is CRP and intra-state Texas is all still obviously short haul and pretty much most of my flying these days unless we go out of state for vacation. I do a lot of round trip CRP-HOU-DAL because there is no non-stop from CRP to DAL on WN, so that's a real short hop in that regard.

I had my first run with the new system across three flights over the weekend. I don't mind being separated into boarding groups, although I wish there was some modicum of explanation as to how boarding groups are determined. The big difference between the old system where you had a specific line number and this one is the mad scramble and minor chaos of people trying to get a better position in line within their boarding group.

One thing I noticed, which is probably not related to the seating change, was it seems like they are asking more people to voluntarily gate-check bags than before, and they were definitely much more stringent with checking bag sizes and ordering mandatory gate-check for some people. One of my flights ended up getting delayed by 30 minutes because people were constantly arguing with the gate agent over bag size.

Being able to select my seat had some advantages in that I could see if the middle seat was still vacant, and I ended up being able to select the same seat for all of my flights.

• Groups 1-2: A-List Preferred, Choice Extra fare, and Extra Legroom seat customers.
• Groups 3-5: A-List members, Choice Preferred fare, and Rapid Rewards Credit Card members.
• Groups 6-8: Choice fare and Basic fare customers.