Flight review: Turkish Airlines “Turkoflot” A350-900 business class (Seattle to İstanbul) [SEA to IST]

To start my very first sojourn to India, I flew Turkish Airlines from Seattle to Delhi transiting in İstanbul. I had the pleasure of enjoying one of their most luxurious business class hard and soft products on this route.

Why I booked this flight

I had been eyeing this route for fun for a while after my friend visited his family in India. I was interested because I have been very interested in India for over a decade and can speak some Hindi, so there was some genuine interest I had in visiting. On the other hand, traveling solo to India is difficult and probably merits thinking twice.

In February 2024, Turkish Airlines announced a massive devaluation. Specifically, they would be charging for each segment separately now, rather than giving a cheap price for a connecting flight. To add insult to injury, they also raised the price of each segment. Therefore, the price increase was going to be more than double to fly to anywhere except İstanbul. The only saving grace was they gave one-week notice. It gave me time to think about it.

At the time, the saver business class cost 52,500 Turkish Airlines miles each way. If you could find this price, it was certainly one to consider snapping up! I found availability around Thanksgiving to go to Delhi and back from Mumbai. Compared to any other option, this was an amazing deal that would never be available ever again. I realized there wasn’t going to be another opportunity this good in the future, so I decided to jump on it.

I used the entirety of my Capital One Venture X sign-up bonus, totaling 90,000 points, plus the 10,000 I earned by spending from it, and topped it off with another 5,000 Bilt points.

Troubles before the flight

First of all, it is a pain dealing with Turkish Airlines reservations. Specifically, it is a pain to book tickets on Miles and Smiles. The website frequently glitches out and often won’t take a certain kind of card, so you’re left reluctantly paying with another credit card. The call center staff are excellent at coming up with BS excuses of why their website isn’t working, and in response, they tell you to try again in an hour. That just means they don’t know what they are doing.

I ended up realizing I couldn’t pay for the taxes my return segment from Mumbai to Seattle because I did not choose to pay in U.S. dollars but in Indian rupees. This was a stupid system issue that could easily have been resolved, but alas, that is just how things are sometimes.

Even worse, I was told about a month before my scheduled flight that I was going to be flying out one day earlier from Seattle to İstanbul, and I’d need to do an overnight layover in İstanbul. Turkish Airlines refused to give a hotel as part of their layover program because it “wasn’t originally booked as that”. Unfortunately, the laws were not on my side, and since I had no recourse, I was left with no choice but to book a hotel in İstanbul with my own money.

Check-in and boarding

Check-in began 3.5 hours before departure. Because I had to get a ride quite early, I waited quite a long time with my luggage before the check-in counter finally opened.

Once it did, I checked my bags in and headed for the United Club for a bit for $#!%s and giggles before making my way to the lounge I was actually intending to visit, the Centurion Lounge. (Lounge review for the SEA United Club coming soon.)

I then arrived at the flight. The boarding process was a mess. They tell you to get into two lines depending on where on the airplane you’re seated, but surprise, there is a third line on the side for business class. Ugh, I hate it when airlines board with little regard to it making sense or even respecting premium classes and the extra money they paid for better boarding privileges.

The cabin, the seat, and the amenities

As I went inside, I realized we had gotten lucky. This is one of the A350s that was supposed to be sold to Aeroflot, but was instead given to Turkish Airlines after Russia invaded Ukraine and the West placed sanctions on Russia. My friend informed me that these A350s were called “Turkoflots”, due to their cabins being very distinct from a typical Turkish A350.

This cabin doesn’t have any storage in the middle, creating what’s known as “cathedral ceilings”. At the expense of overhead storage space, which, admittedly, is not that necessary in business class’s spread-out seating, the cabin feels a lot more spacious and comfortable.

As I arrived at my seat, I couldn’t help but be amazed by the cabin.

This cabin layout features window seats that are staggered row-by-row, with some closer to the window and others closer to the aisle.

In this plane, even-numbered rows were closer to the window. Thus, I picked my seat to be 2A. Here it is:

Here’s me sitting down and figuring everything out:

The window shades were mechanical but automatic, which was really cool to see. The buttons to pull up or down the shades were located above the window.

At my seat were slippers, with the slipper bag doubling as a shoe bag for the duration of the flight. Nice!

The slippers were dark-colored, matching the aesthetic of the other parts of the cabin, and more importantly, comfy.

Noise-canceling headphones were offered in the storage compartment.

There seems to be a crevice between the side table and the seat, which is where I could put a cup and some other stuff. However, it doesn’t end up being very practical, as I don’t want to knock over a drink while I’m sitting or sleeping.

By the way, there’s a small wardrobe too!

Settling in

A flight attendant walked past and offered some flavored lemonades, a Turkish Airlines speciality. I picked the regular lemonade.

Around this time, I found on the edge of the side table is where the recline buttons are.

They also provided the menu while were still on the ground.

I started browsing it.

Here’s the wines.

Night lights!

Before take off, they started playing the safety demo. Part of it had an animated flight attendant doing sign language.

Business class passengers get 1 GB of data for free for the duration of the flight. Be careful with using it though; it can run out fast!

I assume Turkish Airlines takes flight safety very seriously. In case you weren’t sure whether you could smoke a cigarette, or use your laptop, or whether you needed to have your seatbelt on, you had not one but two screens to remind you.

Turkish Airlines has a rotating slideshow of various destinations. And you’ve got to admit, they have some beautiful, captivating photos.

Dinner service

Soon after take off, meal service started. First came the hot towel.

Then, they came by and provided me with an LED “candle”, which was quite a cute touch to it all. We were able to select our little mezzes (hors d’oeurves) from a cart.

One of the flight attendants dresses up in a chef’s outfit while serving the food. I didn’t take a photo of the “flying chef” (who was one of the female flight attendants) for two reasons. One, I just don’t want to take photos of flight attendants. Two, this flying chef looked like one of my friends’ mom.

But anyway, here’s what I selected, and all of these were absolutely delicious:

For my main, I had some grilled fish, mashed potatoes, and zucchini. In stark contrast to the amazing mezzes I just had, it looked like a microwavable meal from Safeway. Sorry, but yuck.

For dessert, we could select among a large selection of Turkish dessert options. One of them was baklava. I cannot remember what the other two were.

Sleep

After dinner service concluded, it came time to sleep.

I asked for a digestive tea, but they ran out, so they offered me the relaxing tea as well. Seeing that it was Rooibos, I was reassured that this was indeed going to help me relax. And, for inflight standards, this was actually a great tea. Probably the best I’ve had on board a flight.

I asked the flight attendants to make my bed.

When fully reclined, it forms a full-sized bed with good footwell space.

They didn’t give any pajamas though, which was unfortunate.

I remember sleeping very well. There were overhead individual air nozzles, which I gladly turned on.

The cabin temperature was comfortable, and so was the bedding. Combined with the tea, I had no trouble falling asleep, and in fact, I had some of the best sleep on a plane I’ve ever had.

Lavatory

While I didn’t have anything to change into, I still visited the lavatory to ensure I was ready before sleeping.

Turkish Airlines keeps its business lavatories well stocked with a nice scent (hence the scent sticks you see) and even an eau de toilette (which is the formal term for a short-lasting fragrance). The white bottle is lotion and the bottle to the right of it is a nice, fancy fragrant soap. I was a huge fan!

Breakfast service

After waking up, it was time for breakfast.

First came the fruit salad, bread roll, and the typical delicious accoutrements that come with a Turkish breakfast, such as the tomatoes, cucumbers, cheese, and yogurt. This was accompanied by fresh orange juice. It was great.

This was followed by my main breakfast, which was an omelette with potatoes and mushrooms. Honestly, it was pretty bad.

Landing

As the flight concluded, we were greeted by dusk in İstanbul.

We flew over the Asian part of İstanbul during the descent. It was beautiful.

And here we are about to land at İstanbul Airport (IST).

Conclusion

Turkish Airlines business class definitely gives me mixed feelings, but overall, I walked away amazed at the nice parts of the experience. There were highs and lows, and it felt like the experience alternated between them.

The booking process was straight up infuriating. I do not want to deal with Miles and Frowns ever again, and thanks to the devaluation, I don’t think I will need to anytime soon. I think, however, the good on-board experience made up for the immense frustrations I had with Turkish Airlines.

The airport check-in experience was not necessarily the friendliest I’ve encountered. The boarding process at Seattle–Tacoma International Airport was poorly organized and not very intuitive for business class passengers. (I think it was somewhat better at the İstanbul Airport.)

The most exciting part of the experience was the Turkoflot cabins. I think they are amazing. These represent a much better hard product than the regular Turkish Airlines A350 business class products (which I took on my way back from İstanbul to Seattle). I’m really glad I got the opportunity to ride on a Turkoflot.

The amenities were nice. In fact, to this day, every night I wear the eye mask I got from the flight. My sleep on the flight was some of the best I’ve ever had in the skies.

The food was a rollercoaster. I had both some of the very best foods on any airline and also some of the worst. The Turkish mezzes were absolutely mindblowing. Some would say they cure cancer. I’d say it was pretty close to it. On the other hand, I was left bewildered by the stark contrast of the mains, which were unfortunately very disappointing. I would like to think it is because it wasn’t catered directly out of İstanbul and perhaps out-station catering in Seattle just didn’t meet the mark, but nonetheless, if we are paying for a business class experience, we would expect something better than this, ideally. And then, the desserts went back to being very good.

And the same story was true for breakfast. Bad main, but everything else was excellent.

This hot-and-cold treatment was very confusing for me and other passengers alike.

The flight attendants gave great service. They were friendly and spoke good English. The lemonades and teas were awesome. The wines were good enough for me. The lavatories were clean, well-maintained by the flight attendants, and always smelled nice.

All in all, I’d definitely fly it again, as the good overshadowed the bad. However, I will be sure to pack some patience for the frustrating aspects on the ground, as well as for the bad mains I had for dinner and breakfast. But the latter is an insignificant small issue compared to all of the other positives.

I hope everyone gets the chance to fly a Turkoflot someday!