Delta is planning for a premium-heavy Airbus A350-1000 widebody, with the first plane being delivered next year or (more likely) delayed into 2027, according to aviation watchdog JonNYC.
He says to expect “20 aircraft being delivered in a 28-month time frame.” The most exciting thing is that these planes will feature a new Delta One Suite in business class, as well as new economy seats.
this is what that original delivery schedule looked like:
2026
3Q: 12026
4Q: 32027:
1Q: 1
2Q: 32028
1Q: 3
2Q: 5
3Q: 2
4Q: 2— JonNYC (@xjonnyc.bsky.social) July 2, 2025 at 5:19 PM
and, yes, I confidently predict that there will be a new DeltaOne suite introduced (as well as new seats in Comfort and Main.)
— JonNYC (@xjonnyc.bsky.social) July 2, 2025 at 6:50 PM
These planes come from the order Delta placed 18 months ago with 20 aircraft firm and options for 20 more.
Airbus A350-900, Credit: Delta
Airbus A350-900, Credit: Delta
Delta was the first U.S. airline, and second airline in the world behind Qatar Airways, to put doors on direct aisle access long haul business class seats. However their long haul fleet still doesn’t have these fully installed. And the seat has definitely been surpassed by competitors. Delta’s basic seat is the Thompson Vantage XL, which isn’t close to top of market for current business class.
Current Delta Suite
American Airlines now has business class suites on their new Boeing 787-9P, using Adient Ascent seats which are excellent (though in a dense configuration). United has announced that their new delivery 787s will have a similar seat as well. So Delta needs to avoid falling into last place (a spot currently held amongst the three by United, though Delta’s 767 seats are the worst flying long haul for a U.S. or European flag carrier).
American Airlines Boeing 787-9P
Delta has upped its game on the ground with Delta One lounges, and is improving its soft product (with better wines, though a step behind United, and better bedding). New seats on new planes helps, but as of now there’s no plan to retrofit existing aircraft with the new seat that they unveil with A350-1000 aircraft.
@ Lil Tim — That all will end when UA acquires B6’s NYC gates. Stop dreaming that the current adminstrtion will block it. It’s all about paying bribes, and Kirby has paid his. I’m surely kick in more when asked. DL has no chance to block the expansion of UA. DL will fall to a forever #2 position. Too bad.
stop dreaming that United will be bailed out of its strategic failures
DL contributed to big boy’s inaugural too. and the FAA didn’t slap any of DL’s hubs w/ huge capacity cuts. Hot lot of nothing those bribes did for UA
Tim Dunn says: …the FAA didn’t slap any of DL’s hubs w/ huge capacity cuts.
Do you not even understand what a slot restricted airport is? See JFK, LGA and soon EWR for which Kirby has been asking the FAA.
Poor TD
and do you realize that EWR WAS slot-controlled and it was stripped of that status because UA – even under a different leadership team – failed to use its EWR slots to FAA requirements?
Kirby can ask for slot-controlled status all day long – and he likely will – but the FAA achieved what it wanted which is to reduce the capacity of EWR – but w/o permanently locking in UA’s status as operating 65% of EWR’s flights, the highest percentage of any of the most congested NE airports.
Again, you and UA want the FAA to fix UA’s strategic problems including being so heavily concentrated at EWR but it is not the American public’s job to support higher fares by increasing the concentration of one of the top 2 carriers in NYC by expanding or reinforcing hub dominance.
And the upshot of the FAA’s decision not to extend slot controls to EWR is to make it possible for AA and/or DL to add flights from EWR including to the west coast if UA becomes likely to gain flights at JFK- which is also just a UA pipe dream.
I’m glad you have moved on from trying to defend Polaris to arguing about anything under the sun; you do provide great reading material for 1990 and others on their DL flights which have free high speed WiFi.
and the sign at JFK is still up touting DL as NYC’s #1 airline
Tim Dunn says: …the FAA achieved what it wanted which is to reduce the capacity of EWR
Your cluelessness knows no bounds. Poor TD.
I thought someone else might insult others to the Max to avoid facing reality but you might take the cake.
Yes, the FAA did achieve a reduction in flight capacity at EWR while not locking in UA’s dominance. EWR remains schedule controlled, not slot-controlled which means that the FAA “invited” all airlines that serve EWR to provide their proposals to reduce capacity on an equal basis and they largely achieved that with a 21% reduction in flights during May. UA’s reduction, however, was 26% which was only beat by NK’s 28%. DL’s flight reduction was only 15% and AA’s was only 10%
the FAA might lift levels somewhat but there have been frequent ATC delays for all of the NYC airports due to weather. It is highly unlikely that EWR will ever return to the level of capacity that UA operated – and which has resulted in severe overscheduling at EWR for years.
UA resisted cutting because they knew it would hand the #1 ranking in NYC to DL but the FAA forced UA’s hand, thanks to Kirby’s need to blame the FAA for a planned runway construction project and UA’s overscheduling. The FAA did its part w/ new data cables that should eliminate the radar outages but that contributed very little to delays even if it was very scary and had to be fixed.
unlike you and someone else, I know and speak the facts.
UA will be #2 in NYC behind DL. The sheer size of UA’s fall means that, at least for now, UA and DL are likely of the same size even for RPMs and revenue
More wishful thinking. Standby for just another in what will be a long series of rude awakenings and loads of cognitive dissonance.
Poor TD.
what you are deathly afraid of is that DL’s 15 year strategy of growing NYC is paying off in part because of UA and Scott Kirby’s strategic failures at UA and US which have helped DL.
all of the insults you throw don’t change that reality.
Tim never ceases to embarrass himself lol
What a joke of a life
Fired from delta but the biggest unrequited love on earth since he has no other human contact In his life except those they respond to him in the comments
Banned at other websites
Get a life, Timmy
Stop dreaming of mine and mentioning it 😉
You’re pathetic
to no surprise, Max returns to poop in the middle of the conversation because he can’t add anything to the conversation.
DL played its game in NYC flawlessly. UA has made one strategic error after another.
The whole notion that having a single hub at EWR was flawed and many of us saw it all along. EWR is not and never will be capable of handling the amount of traffic that DL can handle with hubs at 2 NYC airports.
JFK alone can handle one third more flights than EWR; EWR can handle about the same number of flights as LGA – widebodies at EWR, yes, but EWR is not and never was capable of being a single airport hub for NYC.
and back to Jon’s original post.
If he is correct that DL will receive 12 35Ks in 2028 and 8 in 2027 (or late 2026), there will be a massive amount of ultra long haul capacity coming into DL’s system in a very short time.
There is no way that DL will launch that many new routes in such a short time -which means that DL will be aggressively adding new flights over the next couple years and then upgauging to the 35K when those planes arrive – along w/ adding a few new routes. The competitive impact when those planes arrive will be nothing short of amazing.
and DL is supposedly getting close to finalizing a deal with Boeing for 787-10s as replacements for a chunk of the 767 fleet.
DL is clearly moving to a “big metal” strategy across its international network – just part of how it could displace UA not just in NYC but in one international market after another.
as much as Max wants to throw insults, he can’t change DL’s winning trajectory
So Delta started adding Delta One Suites to their international wide body aircraft in 2017 and they will have them installed on only 80 aircraft by the end of the year? That’s only 10/year and well less than half of their 176 wide body aircraft fleet? And Delta has A321 Neos parked with the engines removed because they failed to get approvals prior to delivery? What’s the problem with Delta fleet management? How out of date is the rest of the so-called premium seating on Delta wide bodies?.
United’s Polaris Suites have been installed on their entire international wide body fleet of 204 aircraft for years along with Premium Plus and Economy Plus and with far more premium seats (High J). The new Polaris Suites and Studios in new 787s start arriving this year.
The new Delta One Suites (no studios) arrive in 2027? Yikes!