Hallo from Zermatt! I’m fresh off my first flight on Swiss this morning, and I’m interested to see what the places we’re going to in Switzerland have to offer. I’m also at the tail end of a mad routing from London to Zurich via home (Hong Kong), so it’s nice to get that checked off the list too. The WiFi here is rather sketchy, but I haven’t actually checked into my chalet yet (I’m at a restaurant, so I’ll see if it’s a Zermatt issue or just a restaurant issue).

Zermatt, Switzerland

While my personal best flight of the year isn’t this flight, I wouldn’t hesitate to fly Swiss again, especially on their new 777-300ER (and I am late next January – stay tuned for that). Here are my initial impressions:

Swiss 777-300ER Business Class Seat

Then, moving forward one cabin, Swiss has two business-class sections on its 777-300ER. The main cabin has a whopping 52 seats arranged in a staggered configuration that alternates between 1-2-2 and 2-2-1, depending on the row. Unfortunately, as with Swiss’ other long-haul aircraft, all business-class seats are not created equal.

Swiss uses the Vantage XL seat in business class on their 777-300ER, which is basically an enhanced version of the Vantage style seats found on their A330 and A340.

The Business Class cabin on KLM’s Boeing 777-300ER aircraft, which KLM calls ‘World Business Class’ is split across two sections. The forward section accommodates 28 passengers across five rows (four rows on the far right hand side), while a single-row cabin behind the second main aircraft doors and directly ahead of Economy Class has a. We flew in SWISS business class onboard their flagship 777 aircraft as a part of a SWISS 3 Continent Global Fare. The cabin is large for a business class cabin, with 64 business class seats and an alternating 1-2-2 / 2-2-1 configuration.

Swiss 777 Business Class

Swiss Boeing 777-300ER Business Class Seats 5A and 5B

It’s definitely not my preferred layout, by any chance, but given what I’ve heard from the old Vantage style seats, they’re great.

Swiss Boeing 777-300ER Business Class Seat 5K

Swiss Airlines First Class Review

I ended up sitting in seat 5K for most of the flight, which was a throne seat. I’ve heard that the foot space can be really restricted in these seats – while the space is a little restricted, I didn’t feel like I was wedging my feet in the area, which definitely seems like an improvement.

Swiss Boeing 777-300ER Business Class Seat 5K Footwell

It ended up being void, though, as seats 4J and 4K were also completely empty, and 4K had a huge footwell as well as lots of privacy.

Swiss Boeing 777-300ER Business Class Bed

I moved there between meals (maybe it’s just me and night flights, but I slept the whole time and even woke up a few minutes late for breakfast).

Swiss Boeing 777-300ER Business Class Seat 4K Bed Footwell

The seat also has good controls – as well as the “normal” controls, you can also increase the firmness of the seat (I set it to the softest setting), lumbar support, lumbar prominence as well as a massage function, which I found cool.

Swiss Boeing 777-300ER Business Class Controls

I’ll save the rest for the actual report.

Swiss 777-300ER Business Class Headphones

Swiss uses noise-cancelling headphones in business class. They’re definitely not Bose, but they’re pretty good quality – my entertainment system wasn’t working, but I did manage to check them out in another (my original) seat and the headphones were pretty good.

Swiss Boeing 777-300ER Business Class Headphones

I mean, I don’t love them, but I certainly don’t hate them either…

Swiss 777-300ER Business Class Lavatory

While the rest of the lavatory is nothing special, Swiss must have one of the classiest sinks out there for business class. No, there aren’t any special toiletries or anything, but overall it is nice.

Swiss Boeing 777-300ER Business Class Lavatory

Swiss Boeing 777-300ER Business Class Lavatory

Swiss 777-300ER Business Class Food

Don’t get me wrong, Swiss definitely doesn’t have the best catering I’ve ever experienced, at least in terms of the presentation. While the appetiser was awesome, please don’t tell me you haven’t seen pretty much this presentation of salmon on a flight before.

Swiss Boeing 777-300ER Business Class Appetiser

Coming to the main, it definitely looked underwhelming. But the veal was perfectly cooked in the middle (yes, every single piece) and the rosti cake was great. The flavour was mindblowing and easily rivaled a restaurant dish on the ground, but the presentation, obviously, was lacking.

Swiss Boeing 777-300ER Business Class Main Course

Breakfast was a little less attractive, but it was still good. I felt like the eggs weren’t as well seasoned as they should’ve been, but the crepe was good and the sauce was great. The aubergines were definitely salted, as they weren’t obnoxiously bitter.

Swiss Boeing 777-300ER Business Class Breakfast

Swiss 777-300ER Business Class Service

Here’s where it gets interesting. Swiss’ service was easily the most well-intentioned I’ve ever received. All the flight attendants (apart from one in her 20s, who was mediocre) took care of all of us as well as they could, and were friendly, smiling and tried to help us with every interaction. When I first came in taking pictures, I almost had to blow my cover given how happy the purser was with me taking pictures (I didn’t). She asked if it was my first time on a 777, which I said no, but it was my first time on Swiss. She was ecstatic and tried to take care of me throughout the rest of the flight.

Swiss Boeing 777-300ER Business Class Cabin – one of the many pictures I took during the first five minutes of the flight

But they were slow. I get it, the 777-300ER’s pretty new to them, and the load was about 75%. But a call button was pretty much ignored every time, and after meals it took a pretty long time for them to get rid of the stuff in front of us. They were in the galley – they looked really busy all the time, so clearly they were flustered.

So it wasn’t well executed, no, but props to the crew for still being as amazing as they could.

Bottom Line

Swiss’ 777-300ER is something I will be on a couple of times in the next year or so, so I’m kind of looking forward to each flight to see if my perspective changes. While I found everything inviting, it’ll still take all the flight attendants some time to get used to the aircraft.

I wouldn’t hesitate to fly Swiss again, and would probably look forward to every subsequent flight.