Flight Info
- Flight Number: JX 2
- Seat: 4A
- Aircraft: Airbus A350-900
- Scheduled Departure Time: March 2, 2023 11:40 PM
- Arrival Time: March 4, 2023 5:50 AM
- Flight Time: 14 hours 6 minutes
- How I Booked: 60,000 Alaska Airlines Miles + ~$31.47 in taxes booked 9 months in advance. This pricing was part of an introductory promotion for the Alaska Airlines and Starlux partnership.
Check In And Arrival Process
I arrived at LAX 2.5 hours before my scheduled departure time. Thankfully, there was no line at the check-in counter for business class so I was able to quickly get my boarding pass. One special thing about Starlux is that they have a partnership with the Los Angeles Dodgers so you’ll see lots of Dodgers-branded things on the ground and in the air when departing from LAX.
For example, there were Dodgers-branded bag tags in the shape of a baseball bat. These were free to take at the check-in counter so I grabbed two.
However, as neat as this was, I was still kind of disappointed because that was the only piece of Dodgers memorabilia there. I had heard that in the past Starlux gave out Dodgers-branded boarding pass holders so I was really excited to get one but unfortunately, they didn’t have those anymore. It was also a bit of a letdown seeing that the back of the boarding pass wasn’t Dodgers branded either and only showed a car advertisement.
During check-in, something I wasn’t expecting was that the agent said she had to put on a carry-on tag for my luggage.
Another interesting thing was that Starlux gives you a physical lounge pass. Usually, the boarding pass itself is enough for lounge admission but I guess that since Starlux isn’t an official OneWorld partner, the Qantas lounge required this extra step.
The agent also handed me a paper map with directions on how to get to the lounge. Before heading out, she told me that the lounge is quite far away from the gate and that I should probably leave 20 minutes before the scheduled boarding time to make sure I was not late.
Lounge
Starlux business class passengers receive complimentary access to the Qantas OneWorld lounge. This was my first time visiting this lounge and I have to say that it’s honestly a really good business class lounge. The lounge is huge and offers lots of seating, great food, and fantastic decor. I enjoyed my time relaxing in there and would recommend checking it out if you can.
Boarding
Starlux flies out of LAX at gate 202 which is in a separate, further wing of Tom Bradley International Terminal. I heeded the advice of the counter agent and left the lounge 20 minutes before my scheduled boarding time. I was curious how long it would actually take to walk there so I timed it and got to my gate in about 15 minutes without taking any of the moving walkways.
As for the boarding process, it was pretty standard. About 10 min before the official boarding time, workers will set up signs marking the start of the waiting lines for the different cabins and direct people accordingly.
One of the TVs will mark the dedicated line that business class passengers, first-class passengers, and passengers with Insighter/Explorer can use.
I was hoping to keep my ticket as a souvenir but after scanning my boarding pass, the gate agent ended up ripping off a large part of the ticket and just handed me back the small ticket stub to show the attendants when boarding the plane.
Cabin
WOW! That was my first impression of the cabin. It’s SO new and modern. You can immediately tell that this plane is new as there are practically no signs of wear and tear anywhere. The leather and the seat features all still look pristine and in great shape.
I found the aircraft’s interiors to be extremely well-designed as well. Starlux’s theme focuses on outer space and a futuristic feel. You definitely get that sense from the way the cabin looks because it almost feels like a spaceship. The color scheme of the seats, dark walls, and lighting from the lamp all combined nicely to create this futuristic-looking cabin that is stunning. The seat decor isn’t the only thing that showcases this outer space theme as even their safety video takes place in space.
The Business class cabin is comprised of 26 seats in a 1-2-1 reverse herringbone pattern. Row 8, which is the last row in business class, only has 2 middle seats instead of the normal 4.
One unique thing about Starlux’s A350s is that there are no overhead bins over the middle seats. I’ve never seen this before and thought that this would lead to a lack of overhead bin space but that wasn’t the case. Everyone managed to fit all of their carry-ons in the overhead bins above the window seats even though those bins were already containing the seat mattress pads.
Seats
The Starlux business class seats on their A350 are incredible. Each seat is sleek, modern, high-tech, and looks fantastic. I especially loved how the dark leather of the seat and the gray of the seat walls and storage sections paired so well with some of the orange seat finishings.
Each seat comes with a pillow and blanket already waiting for you after you board.
The awesome thing is that these seats even come with sliding doors!
When the door is closed, you’ll notice that it doesn’t extend fully to the floor. There is still a small gap between the floor and the bottom of the door but the top of the door is flush with the top of the seat.
When you’re seated with the door closed, you can’t look over and see your neighbors which gives you lots of privacy.
The seat has two sets of seat controls. There is a larger digital touchscreen panel near the seat lamp which is the main way of controlling the seat. This control panel lets you adjust the seat position, lamp brightness, call a flight attendant, and even control the transparency of the window. The third button down on the right is the “do not disturb” button.
One complaint I have is that the flight attendant button did not work the two times I tried it. I pressed it and waited a couple minutes each time and no one came. The call attendant button on the TV and the remote worked fine though.
The second control panel is directly next to the seat and features just 3 buttons allowing you to put the seat in upright mode or bed mode and control the seat light. It’s similar to the control panel in Cathay Pacific first class.
I honestly saw no reason to use this control panel when the touch screen one offered more customization to your seat position and had way more features.
I did like how the seat offered so much storage space. The largest and most convenient storage compartment is the storage cabinet near the headrest of the seat. There is a button next to the cabinet that will pop it open and you can easily snap it closed when finished. The side of the cabinet door that faces the interior also has a vanity mirror.
Inside the cabinet are the headphones, a bottle of water, a facial mask, charging ports, a wireless charging pad, and the TV remote. I liked how there was even a little hook for you to hang your headphones on.
The cabinet looks small in the pictures but is surprisingly large. I could even fit my amenity kit in there with no problems.
The side table also has a mini storage container that you can pop open with another button similar to the previous cabinet. This one is an odd triangle shape and very shallow. You can only really store small items like a phone or passport here.
Lastly, there is the standard document storage pocket that holds the menu and aircraft information documents. Right next to it is also another cubby for additional storage space.
One of my favorite parts of the seat was the little seat lamp that extended over the side table. It’s simple yet adds a sense of elegance to the seat. You can control the light levels of this lamp via the main digital control panel.
Each seat also has a small reading light that you can access by pushing the indentation at the top to reveal the light.
The dining table sits beneath the TV and once you pull it out, you need to unfold the flaps to fully expose the entire table.
This was pretty random but there is also a little coat hook in the back of the seat in front of you.
As mentioned earlier, the technology of the seat was exceptional as well. The charging ports not only support international chargers and USB-A but also USB-C! The remote is also fancy with a mini LED screen displaying the route and local time. Even though I didn’t use the remote much, I liked how responsive the trackpad was when interacting with the TV.
One of the coolest tech features of the seat was the wireless charging pad. This was one of the things I was most excited to use because the convenience this offers is a true game changer. However, I was pretty disappointed at how unreliable it was. I placed my phone in all kinds of positions on the pad and tried multiple times to charge my phone but only got my phone to start charging once. I eventually gave up and just used the traditional charging port instead.
The seat’s footwell has a trapezoid shape and was decently spacious. It didn’t feel very narrow or cramped when I was sleeping.
For those sitting in the middle seats, there is a privacy divider that you can slide open and close.
One really unique thing about the seat that I forgot to take pictures of was the seat window. The windows have touchscreen settings that let you control the brightness coming in from the outside. You can press these touchscreen buttons on the window or use the seat control panel to dim the windows to your desired level.
This flight was an evening flight so take this with a grain of salt. I found that while this window brightness feature was super cool to play around with at first, it is more of a novelty thing than a practical thing.
The full brightness option was still not as bright or easy to see outside as a traditional window. At first, I wasn’t even sure if the setting was working because I couldn’t tell the difference from how dark it was outside. After playing around with it for a bit, I realized that the dimness was changing but it was just very subtle changes each time and wasn’t instant. There was a delay of maybe a second before the actual brightness changed.
However, the fully dim setting did work well and blocked out mostly everything. I would be curious to see how this window would fare for a daytime flight.
I don’t think there is a bad business-class seat in this aircraft. Avoiding rows 7 and 8 is probably a good idea since they’re closer to the bathrooms and could be noisier. Choosing any of the seats in row 4 and row 5 should be fine.
In Flight Entertainment
To me, the real winner of the seat is for sure the TV. It’s HUGE. I was amazed at how large it was and how HD it was as well. I honestly feel that it rivals, if not surpasses, some first-class TVs.
Here’s my hand for reference… I’m not sure which airline has the largest business class TV screen but this has to be in the top 5.
As for the functionality, the TV is touchscreen and very responsive to whatever you press on the screen. Since you’re not seated too far away from the screen, I found the TV’s touchscreen more convenient to use than the TV remote.
If you do want to use the remote, it’s located in the storage cubby and is attached by cord to the holding port.
The remote doesn’t have any directional buttons but instead uses a trackpad to control the TV screen. The trackpad was responsive and worked well when I used it. I liked how the remote showed the time and was very new but honestly with how convenient the touchscreen TV was, there was no real reason to use the remote. I barely used it throughout the flight.
The user interface for the inflight entertainment was intuitive and very easy to navigate. You could scroll between movies, TV shows, music, games, flight information, and also call an attendant from the TV.
I found the movie selection to be very good. There were lots of new Hollywood movies, Mandarin movies, and even some Japanese Anime movies.
The TV show selection, however, wasn’t as expansive as the movie selection but still adequate.
There’s even the food and drink menu accessible via the TV in case you don’t want to flip through the physical menu.
One really innovative feature is that you can connect your own personal headphones to the TV via Bluetooth. I didn’t personally test this out since the Starlux headphones were good enough but it can be convenient for those who prefer wireless headphones over the wired ones that Starlux gives. This feature is also not exclusive to business class and is available to all cabins, which is a terrific benefit.
One thing I didn’t like about the in-flight entertainment was that there was no search function. The best you could do was to filter on preset categories but having a search feature would make it so much easier to find things or quickly see if a movie was available or not.
Pajamas
Starlux is one of the few airlines that does give business class passengers pajamas on long-haul flights. The pajamas are handed out shortly after take-off and come in a drawstring cloth pouch.
The pajamas are a 2 piece set with a long-sleeved top and long pants. They’re a pretty drab gray color with the Starlux logo printed on the back side of the top. I kind of wish the logo was on the front and was more visible but it’s not a big deal. I was given a size large and found the pajamas to be on the baggier side. The sleeve openings of the top and the cuffs of the pants are quite large.
However, the pajamas are very soft and comfortable. They’re also a thicker material and don’t feel cheap.
I liked how the pants come with pockets and that the pockets are not sewn on the outside.
There is also a drawstring bag waiting at each seat that contains slippers.
The slippers are on par with the slippers you’ll find on other airlines. I appreciated that they were close-toed, decently thick, and overall pretty comfy. One minor thing is that the slippers are a darker gray that doesn’t match the gray of the pajamas. I’m curious why they didn’t try matching the colors to make the whole pajama set look more uniform.
Amenity Kit
Business class passengers also receive a Bric’s brand amenity kit wrapped in plastic that is already present at the seat before boarding. I thought it was super cute how the amenity kit is designed to be like a miniature suitcase.
The amenity kit also contained many more items than I expected. Inside the amenity kit are socks, an eye mask, a foldable comb, earplugs, a Starlux sticker, a toothbrush, toothpaste, and a mini pouch containing a facial spray, lip balm, and moisturizing cream. The creams and sprays are also Huygen brand which is the same brand of the creams and sprays found in the onboard bathrooms.
There was also an essence mask found in the little cubby holding the headphones that wasn’t in the amenity kit. This is the first time I’ve seen a facial mask offered as an amenity so I thought that was pretty neat.
Wifi
Starlux offers complimentary Wifi to business-class passengers. I loved how easy it was to connect and how there’s a whole guide on the TV you can pull up to walk you through the process.
Once you’re at cruising altitude, you can connect to the Galactic_WiFi network. Then going to the Wifi website, you’ll be met with a sign-in screen to check for your Wifi eligibility.
The sign-in screen will ask you for your email, last name, and date of birth.
If you entered all your information correctly, you’ll be taken to a page informing you that you have complimentary access for flying in business class.
The Wifi speed was unfortunately very inconsistent. I had some speed issues browsing Instagram but other social media apps like Reddit and X were fine. When browsing the internet, some web pages loaded fast and some were really slow. I had no issues sending text messages but sending pictures would take forever and occasionally fail. I wish that the speed was more reliable but for free Wifi, I can’t complain.
Pre Departure
Before takeoff, while passengers were still boarding the plane and getting situated, a flight attendant came by to give me a hot towel and a honey cucumber drink. I’m normally not a fan of cucumber but I honestly couldn’t taste any cucumber. The drink was mildly sweet and had a thick consistency but was pretty tasty.
Shortly after that, the same flight attendant came by and asked me if I wanted her to introduce the seat functions to me. I gladly accepted and she walked me through all of the different seat controls and main buttons.
Once the pre-departure drinks had been cleared away, the flight attendants handed out our pajamas and also took our dinner order. Before takeoff, the flight attendants walked down to clear away any remaining drinks and also made sure that all of the seat doors were open and locked in place.
After we had taken off, the flight attendants walked down the cabin unlocking the seat door and allowing you to close the door if you wished. It was an efficient pre-departure process with good pacing. It honestly felt quick because of how often flight attendants came around to either give items or take meal orders.
Dinner Service
Starlux’s menus are quite extensive. Besides the regular food menu, there’s even a dedicated wine menu which is uncommon in business class.
For dinner, they were only serving from the international menu but you could pick from 3 main dishes. 2 of the 3 main dishes were more Westernized while the 3rd one was Taiwanese style. I generally prefer Asian food so I ordered the braised abalone and chicken with fried rice.
There is also a cheese menu but I didn’t end up ordering anything from here.
Inside the food menu, you can also find a list of cocktails and other alcoholic or nonalcoholic beverages. I felt it would have been more intuitive to just make a single beverage menu and have all of the alcoholic drinks on that menu instead of having them split between the food and wine menu.
But aside from that, I thought it was great how there were 5 signature cocktails you could order. Most airlines usually have at most 2 signature cocktails so Starlux’s beverage program shone on this front.
The alcoholic menu was pretty standard with some local choices like TAIWAN BEER.
However, I thought the tea menu was unique in that it offered both Taiwanese teas and English-style teas.
I knew that the Sci-fi Cosmos 2.0 is Starlux’s most famous cocktail so I ordered that to go with my diner.
About 30 minutes after takeoff, flight attendants set our table and brought out the appetizer, and WOW! I was amazed at how elaborate it looked for business class. It’s not typical for you to get your own mini bread basket will 3 different types of bread. In addition to that the grilled octopus was amazing. I’m not sure what the white sauce was but the entire dish was decadent. I wish I could have had more.
The cool thing was that the Sci-fi Cosmos 2.0 cocktail came with a Dodgers and Starlux branded stirrer. It was great seeing all of the collaborative material showing up in different ways. The cocktail is pretty iconic for its signature blue but honestly, I thought it was way too sweet. It wasn’t a bad drink but I wouldn’t order it a second time.
After finishing the appetizer, the flight attendants cleared away the plates while still leaving the serving tray and then brought out the main dish. I’m glad I picked the Taiwanese-style meal because it looked and tasted great too! The chicken was very tender and the oyster sauce added so much flavor to the dish without being overly salty.
I hardly ever eat abalone so it was great being able to enjoy one 35,000 feet in the air!
Finally, for dessert, you had your choice of gelato or a Taiwanese soup dessert. I asked the flight attendant what she recommended and she suggested the gelato so I ordered that. The gelato came out with a plate of fresh fruit and a piece of chocolate. The fruits were fresh and sweet but the real star of dessert was surprisingly the gelato. I have no idea what the actual flavor was but it was so good. It was creamy and just the right level of sweetness. I asked the attendant what flavor it was but I don’t think she heard me correctly because she wasn’t able to give me an answer haha.
After clearing away everything the flight attendants asked if I would like another drink so I opted for the Bi Luo Chun green tea. It was solid and a nice way to wash down the meal. I also liked how the napkin was Dodgers branded too.
Drinks
Starlux business class has a separate wine menu and I liked how many choices there were and how in-depth each of the explanations was. There were 9 different drinks in total consisting of 2 champagnes, 3 white wines, 3 red wines, and 1 fortified wine.
I’m not much of a wine drinker so I ordered a glass of the Bollinger and it was excellent.
Later on that night, I ended up ordering more drinks starting with the Summer Sunbeam cocktail. I honestly preferred this one to the Sci-fi Cosmos 2.0. I don’t mind sweet drinks but it was just too sweet for my liking. This one is sweet but at just the right level. It has a citrusy taste and is refreshing. I would recommend giving this cocktail a shot.
I also like trying unique nonalcoholic beverages so I ended up trying the berry juice. It was extremely average and tasted like any other mixed berry drink you can find in a grocery store. I’d recommend the pineapple juice over this.
Bathroom
Starlux’s A350 has 3 bathrooms for business class passengers with 1 in the front and 2 in the back of the business class cabin. The bathrooms were standard in size compared to other non-A380 aircraft but what set Starlux’s bathrooms apart was how modern and high-tech they were.
I appreciated Starlux’s attention to detail here because even the bathroom door had the same black wallpaper with silver spots like the walls did. Most airlines leave the bathroom door undecorated so this was a nice change to see.
The toilet and sink are both activated by touch-free controls that only require you to wave your hand in front of the sensor to activate them.
The interior was decorated with various kinds of shrubs that contrasted well with the neutral color of the walls and door.
There was nothing revolutionary about the toilet but the whole bathroom was clean and well maintained.
Next to the sink are also Huygens branded moisturizer and facial mist. I’m a big fan of facial mist so I was excited to see this available and made sure to get a few sprays in before landing.
However, my favorite thing about the bathroom was how when you closed the door and locked it, calm music began to play. It wasn’t the upbeat music that Starlux played during boarding but instead, was a more gentle and relaxing music that kind of made you feel like you were floating through outer space. This fit in super well with the whole spaceship vibe that Starlux was going for.
The outside of the bathrooms also have big, bright indicators telling you if the bathroom is vacant or occupied. I liked how easy these signs made it to see if the bathroom was free or not.
Overall the bathroom was clean, high-tech, and had a great aesthetic about it. I appreciated how Starlux even considered the bathroom’s tech and decor when designing their in-flight experience.
Bed
After dinner, a flight attendant came by asking us if we would like them to make the bed for us. Each bed is given a mattress pad that is stowed away in the overhead bins. The great thing is that all business class seats can convert into a full lie-flat bed.
I found the mattress pad, pillow, and blanket to all be very comfortable. However, the bed itself did feel a little bit narrow. I also noticed that if I tried to lift my knee up, I would hit it against the bottom of the TV. I think this is because the TV extends further out than other airlines so the top of the seat in front covers more of your legs than normal.
This wasn’t a big deal but was a little annoying to deal with at times. Despite, this I still managed to get 7 hours of sleep which is the longest period of sleep I’ve gotten on a flight so far.
I will say that when the door is closed, lying in the bed gives you a surreal amount of privacy.
Anytime Menu
Starlux business class passengers can also order from an anytime menu. The anytime menu only had 2 items to choose from: pho or a sandwich. I opted for the pho and was told that it would take about 15 minutes to prepare.
When the pho was served, I thought it was cool how even the towelettes were Dodgers-branded. The pho was decent but nothing super memorable. The meat slices were tender and flavorful and the broth was tasty. However, the tips of some of the noodles were still hard so that was a little bit disappointing.
The chili was very good though and I’d recommend adding that to your pho.
After clearing away the pho, the flight attendants also walked down the cabin with a basket full of snacks. There were dried mango, snickers, gummies, and Nature Valley granola bars. I picked the dried mango which was solid. Sorry for the grainy picture I didn’t realize it was such low resolution when I took it.
Later on, the flight attendants also came by a second time with the same snack basket. I thought the snack basket was a nice touch to service and was surprised they came twice.
Breakfast Service
Breakfast is similar to dinner in that there are 2 options to pick from. You can get the Taiwanese style or an International style breakfast. I always prefer the local style options to the Western ones so I ended up picking the congee.
Breakfast service began around 2 hours out from arrival. Flight attendants first came around to set the tables and then brought out a peach honey drink. It had the consistency of a smoothie and was very tasty.
They also asked if I would like any orange juice or coffee and I chose the coffee. I took this one black and it was pretty good.
Afterwards, they came to serve breakfast and I was really impressed with the presentation of the meal. All of the small side dishes that came with the porridge and the plating looked terrific. I’m a big fan of pork floss so being able to enjoy that in the sky was pretty special to me. If I’m being nit-picky, the chicken was a little bit bland. However, the spicy radish and omelet were great. Overall, it was a wonderful breakfast and I’d highly recommend it if you enjoy congee.
One thing that took me by surprise was that the egg still had its shell on. I thought it was just a regular hard-boiled egg and was about to take a big bite until my spoon unexpectedly hit the eggshell. Just be careful to remove the egg from the shell if you do order this breakfast option.
I also ordered the pineapple juice which ended up being really good. I’d recommend trying that over the mixed berry juice.
After finishing the main breakfast course, the tray was cleared away and fresh fruit was served next. The fruit was sweet and it was nice being given new silverware to use.
To finish up the meal I ordered a cappuccino to wake myself up and get ready for my long day ahead. It was pretty good and definitely gave me some much-needed energy.
Landing in Taipei
About 30 minutes from landing, the flight attendants came around to convert our seats back to their upright positions and stow the mattress pads back in the overhead bins.
After that, they also came around with a basket full of gummies. You could pick either strawberry flavor or mint flavor and they came in cute shapes with Starlux branded packaging. I chose strawberry and liked how chewy it was. Some gummies have a weird mushy consistency and I’m glad these gummies weren’t like that.
Overall Service
The service is probably what surprised me the most about this flight. I had heard good things about Starlux’s service but the service still managed to exceed my expectations.
Right from the beginning, I could really feel the warmth and enthusiasm the attendants had when interacting with passengers. From just the way they introduced themselves and greeted passengers with friendliness and smiles to asking if we enjoyed the meal, it was evident that the flight attendants cared about providing high-level service to passengers.
This level of service ended up being consistent throughout the flight and what stood out to me was how proactive the flight attendants were. They always asked unprompted if they could help with anything or could get me anything. This kind of proactivity is usually more common in first class so it was a real treat to get this level of attention in business class.
An example of this is when after waking up, the flight attendant noticed I was now awake and asked me if I would like a snack before breakfast was served. I usually have to call an attendant to request a meal from the anytime menu so it was nice having them check in on how I was doing for a change.
The professionalism and politeness of the flight attendants were another big aspect of the service that I noticed. Every time an attendant came by, they would always first ask for my permission before doing anything. They would open with questions like “May I clear away your dishes” and ” Is it ok if I wake you up later?”. At the end of every interaction, they would even ask me if I would like them to close the seat door.
But what really blew me away was when shortly after takeoff, a flight attendant came by to introduce herself and asked if I enjoyed the ground service. I’ve never been asked about how the experience before boarding was so I was very surprised by that.
This emphasis on the passenger’s complete experience from the ground until landing is what set Starlux apart from other business class experiences I’ve had. This level of care and interest in passengers is so hard to come by nowadays and Starlux truly knocked it out of the park with the service on this flight.
Conclusion
Starlux’s long-haul business class on their A350-900 is superb. The modern seats, incredible service, and yummy food make this a terrific business-class experience that can compete with some of the best airlines in the world.
However, there were still some minor shortcomings like how the wireless charging pad and flight attendant call button in the seat control panel didn’t work properly. Despite that, I would still rank this as my favorite business class experience to date and would highly recommend trying Starlux if you can.
What did you think of Starlux’s long-haul business class?
