If you’re flying between New York and San Francisco or Los Angeles, you’ll find that most airlines offer “upgraded” experiences compared to the rest of their route network. This week, we’ll be extensively reviewing who has the best first class flights coast-to-coast in an attempt to make the most comprehensive analysis out there.

Delta, American, United, JetBlue and Virgin America each fly these routes and compete fiercely on business and first class fares and offerings. I was fortunate enough to fly all six services (AA has both business class and a three-cabin first class) coast-to-coast this year. So I’m in a unique position to present a side-by-side comparison of the seats, food/beverage/service, ground experience, connectivity, and operations of each carrier so you can choose the right flight for you.

Here’s how I’ll break up this series:

• Introduction: Scoring and Considerations
• United Airlines p.s. (757)
• Delta One (757)
• AA Business Class (A321T)
• AA Flagship First (A321T)
• JetBlue Mint (A321T)
• Virgin America (A320)
• Results and Summary

Intro, Categories and Scoring

I wanted to be as objective about this as possible. No flights were compensated by any carrier and crews/staff were not alerted to any review happening, but I took furious notes and created a rubric to compare everything as apples-to-apples as possible.

Download the Transcon Premium Cabin Rubric (Empty)

Download the Completed Transcon Premium Cabin Rublic - NEW!

This is part of the rubric I used to review the airlines on nearly every factor they compete on. Feel free to download it and give it your own weights!

You’ll notice that smaller facets of the experience, like bedding or inflight entertainment, are grouped into larger categories like “service/soft product” and “connectivity”. Each factor is scored independently on a scale from 0 (worst) to 100 (best) and weighted within its category to arrive at a composite score (e.g., food contributes more than whether newspapers were offered).

I’ve designed the rubric to allow you to assign your own weights and the composite scores will readjust, so if there’s a factor that matters more to you, or not at all, you can tweak the weights and arrive at a personalized comparison. (See the orange boxes in Columns I and J)

Here are the main categories and why I grouped them the way I did:

Hard Product (Seat, Cabin, Interior) — 35%

These are things that are literally constructed into the aircraft and probably the single most important part of the flight since it most directly impacts your experience. They also are the hardest to change since it would require taking the aircraft out of service

Soft Product (Food, Service, Amenities) — 25%

These are either performed by people or third party suppliers and are usually opt-in/out as you need them. Important, but not as much as the seat.

Ground Experience (Lounge, Terminal, Gate Areas) — 10%

Everything on the ground from check-in to boarding to lost bags. Matters greatly to some but not at all to others

Connectivity (Inflight Entertainment, Wi-Fi, Power) — 10%

Worth calling out separately since it’s not an easy fix like many of the soft product aspects are and is quite the game changer on flights this long (less so on short-hauls)

Fleet and Operations — 20%

How many seats are on each route and how often those seats arrive on time. Critically important if a carrier is noticeably above or below the industry average, particularly for SFO and JFK where weather can already be an issue.

Stay tuned for a review of each carrier, spaced throughout the week!