Virgin Atlantic RETREAT SUITE vs British Airways CLUB SUITE | Business Class BATTLE 

I have an idea. When you do a review like this, you two should take the other airline on the way back. We all know Nicky loves Virgin LOL, but he should fly back on BA to accurately compare them. At the same time Liam should get some time in Virgin's clubhouse too...😃😃😃. As always it was fun

As soon as I saw it was Nicky and Liam trying Virgin and BA respectively, I just knew Nicky would have gone for Virgin simply for the clubhouse's outside viewpoint deck 😂😂

British Air hands down! Understated quiet decor, 👍🏻. Do & Co catering 😋😋, white tray cloths instead of small placemat 👍🏻, cut crystal glasses 👍🏻 and of course OneWorld miles 😉👍🏻. Sorry Nicky 😢

For me its BA i just love flying with them 😍

The problem is that you have had so much exposure, not just here but in say the Daily Mail its unlikely that you are being treated by a regular passenger. Your food arrives plated perfectly, your call bells get answered in seconds. Crew know who you are. Perhaps an interesting test would be to take someone with you who isn’t known, same flight, same class and see if the service varies

I think BA meals were better... but Virgin just rocks with the atmosphere... :)

My favorite part is always the call bell challenges. Both airlines did pretty good here. I think theyre both equal. Identical from the service , amenity kits, sliding doors (a plus) pretty good

Virgin isn't worth the price difference on the routes I need. BA product and service is excellent

Really enjoyed watching the two comparison of airline. Ive used virgin upper class before and its great. I haven't used British Airways buisness yet though.

Guys really great to watch your videos nice comparison between BA and Virgin offering in business class keep it up.cheers Gowra

Based upon your experiences I'd be happy with either. But Virgin have been our long haul airline of choice for many years. Did the Upper Class Wing for the first time recently. It's nice to arrive in style.

How do you book the retreat suite? It was always greyed out on the seat selection in the app? Great video!

Haven't flown BA Club Suite yet (I will in September), but I have flown Virgin Upper Class London to Mumbai and I really wasn't impressed at all. Food was awful, service really lacking, particularly on the way out, where the FAs were just so miserable and moody. The seat was dirty and the IFE didn't work properly. Such a shame. Glad your experience was miles better.

I Love The Club House In London The Best Business Class Lounge In Europe My Opinion.Great Trip Report

What people always forget to comment on is the difference in scale between the two airlines. Virgin can afford to add more ‘boutique’ touches (such as the upper class wing etc) so BA can never compare on that front for business class passengers due to the size of the operation (ie reserving this for First/ Gold flyers). Plus the retreat seats are not standard for Virgin Upper Class, given the rest of the seats only have a partially closing door.

Thanks for all ur videos

Another great video. On board, both looked pretty good really. I think the Virgin Clubhouse lounge is much better than BA Heathrow lounges (especially Galleries - I've not tried out B-gate lounge). So perhaps Virgin slightly better. Not sure how the prices really compare as each used different numbers of Points / Avios.

almost like qatar seats but these are wider and longer nice

I don’t think these two seats are comparable with BA costing £2200 return, whereas Virgin charges more than double. It seems a little unfair.

Just found you guys and loved this. We’re flying in retreat suite next month. Do you have any videos on Heathrow transit from T3 to T5?

Anytime you can fly business class, you're a winner regardless of airline!

The transit buggy/train/tram is an Automated People Mover 😅

Great vid. Virgin upper is over priced imp, when searching online the are always around 30-50% more money than others.

Virgin Atlantic EVERY time! Crew are amazing!

Flew the neo back from Boston in March, splashed out on the retreat suite upgrade .. (not sure you mentioned the £200 fee) .. had a few teething issues with partitions not going up, suite doors not unlocking .. but was it worth it? Still yes.

Please do westjet 787 dreamliner economy,premium economy and business class only from calgary to tokyo

Nicky and Liam, great review, but you are hard to hear when you speak, the music drowns you out.

Need to do sia video

gr8 video

I would go with Virgin Atlantic on this one! 😅

present continuous is ---- here I am sitting in my seat. I am sat just isn't ...anything

Guys, were do you get the money to do all these videos??????

I'm saying virgal Atlantic wins

the link for the Arrivals channel doesn't work ! remove the @ !

3:48 is the smell of jet fuel supposed to be pleasurable?

Btw, for Liam in 3:57 , that train is called People Mover. Pls pin me

BA club suite, all day long. The Virgin upper class suites are ok, but after a few months become very tatty indeed. That's coming from someone who used to work on these seats.

It is possible to vote for none of the above? IMHO neither offer decent value and both product are miles & miles behind the Middle and Far East competition. . In fact, I'd probably prefer Singapore Business to BA First and definitely over Virgin Upper

Not going to lie, but both these cabins looked more like first class than buisness class.

Great video. One note for anyone using this video to decide booking either airline in business. The Virgin seat shown here is only available on 4 aircraft, there is a different similar seat on the a350 of which there are 10, but a majority of the fleet have a really disappointing seat! In comparison, BA have a the club suite on nearly half the fleet, and In my opinion if you do get lumped with the old club product it’s a better seat than the old upper class. Shame as the route I’m looking to fly does not have VS A330 or A350

Unfair to compare retreat suite with BA club suite. Retreat suite is only on a small number of planes which are subject change at very short notice with no recourse from VIRGIN whereas BA’s 777, A350 and B78X are all club suite. Virgin is good when the star align but if they don’t the coffin seats in upper are probably the worse business class seats in the air.

Changing your channel,names is a really really bad idea... YHBW

I’ve flown both in the last 9 months. The BA club suite is definitely my preference. Much more space and storage. Very comfortable.

I don’t think it’s fair how you compare the retreat suite (better compared to virgins regular suite product) to the standard BA suite. Just saying.

British Airways for me

The comparison was not really fair, Nicky should have gone for the standard Business Class seat on Virgin Atlantic , the front row seats in the middle are special seats which cost extra with extra legroom width.

Looks like a toss-up to me. I’m not a fan of the pink lighting on Virgin nor the general ‘vibe’ in the cabin - really nit picky I know. Given my preference for flying One World (Virgin remind me a lot of JetBlue, which I don’t fly in the US), I’ll stick to BA.

Done this route with both carries, BA just last week. Both are very different, both were great. I’d happily book either. It’s all down to the pricing at the end of the day.

Love VA Upper Class! I flew on a 350-1000 last week from London to Orlando and it was a wonderful experience and the food was exceptional. He was right that they do feed you quite a bit! I love the Virgin Atlantic lounge in London. The lounge is a wonderful and relaxing place!

I would have liked to see the menus to compare them.

The second guest appearance of the apron view deck on TPG UK

Differing between Virgin Atlantic and British Airways offering in the air is really a question of preference. Virgin Atlantic's fun and sexy offering is brilliant and something I really enjoy but British Airways offering is more professional and sophisticated. On the ground Virgin is significantly better than BA however it is worth noting that Virgin is able to offer this experience due to the fact it offers a much smaller route network with a much smaller volume of passengers. Virgin may have the better experience on the A330neo when compared to a BA 777 but when it is a Virgin A350 compared to a BA A350 then it is a much tighter comparison which does come down to preferences of service style as BA offers a better designed seat. Furthermore if you were to compare a Virgin 787 to a BA 787-10 then the vastly superior product would give BA the advantage. And so this shows where the difference is. Virgin is a fantastic airline and their staff always make them a delight to fly however BA offers more consistency and as they aggressively retrofit more aircraft with the club suite then it does feel like BA has the advantage over Virgin for now at least.

Happy Pride Month 🌈 Thank you for being such an affirming and fun space and I wish good luck to everyone across the spectrum.

You can get BA first class for the same price as the retreat though

Awesome review lads! Although I kind of feel that perhaps a Virgin flight using the A350 or B787 would have been more appropriate, reason being is that both the B787 and A350 make up the bulk of Virgin’s LHR-JFK-JFK-LHR traffic and those two business class offerings are in greater numbers than the very few retreat suites as well as being drastically different. Nonetheless it was spectacular to see a review of the retreat suite.

As a person who flies economy to make my points (and cash) go further, I think any lie-flat seat would be amazing, never mind these suites :) Both look great.

Great video, thank you! But how can it be a "battle" if you don't actually draw any conclusions? Rusted on BA GGL flyer here, but I must say the VS facilities do look much better than the tired old BA facilities in T5. Is the grass greener? Hmmmm.....

A slightly better test would be BA’s A350 club suite as the aircraft obviously beats an older 777 even with the same cabin. I’m a BA Gold member and really like the CS, a marked improvement from the old CW cabin. Never liked VA and personally think their products are incredibly overrated

Please, if your going to do reviews like this, then at least compare equal cabins, as others have already said, the virgin suite shown is much nearer the BA first cabin, so not really a fair comparison, as Virgin have only a few of these suites on a few planes, as BA has nearly 260 planes, then the comparison needs to be based on equal products, but it's obvious from the video that their minds are already made up,

Did I understand correctly? Both Channels get renamed and uk Channel will be for races and multicabin stuff and international for Destination vlog stuff?

First you aren’t comparing the same type of product. This video is completely misleading. VA retreat suite is their closest product to First. BA club is what it is, business class. How about you compare the same type of seats/products first. Also when you are in VA retreat, suite you are in the first row, meaning when you call for a crew member they are right there. Where BA seat it’s half way down the cabin. Does the the of the VA cabin have doors?! Come on gents, you can do better! 👎🏼

Think the fact that the VS aircraft is new would swing it for me.. the 777s can be Iver 20yrs old now

hey TPG. love the content, super useful for us UK lot who can’t get a full picture from those who travel from the US. i would love if you guys could do some more credit card and points content. with a video like this, i would love if you could sit down and compare each aspect of the flight with each other to decide which one was better overall. keep up the good work!!

Of course Nicky picked the superior product! (well I think it will be) not watched it yet.

both nice and so but I prefer Virgin Atlantic! Its fresh and new. BA had its heydays with the Concorde. Associate BA more with Brexit then Virgin Atlantic!

The seat comparison wasn't really valid. You were in Virgin's try at an equivalent of F that they charge a premium over business for. The Virgin bias is obvious here.

I recently flew VA Upper Class on their older 787-8 and A350 and I got some really good sleep on both. The staff is amazing and the Clubhouse at Heathrow is by far the best lounge I’ve ever visited. Great video as always!

Great content as always, would be great to get more info on price and points used to travel in these seats and how comparable they are. 🙂👍

and most Virgin Business is not near this nice. My flight was on a plane with a sad business class suite. I love these videos but they have quit giving realistic info. The call bell challenge is particularly hysterical. Obviously the staff has been told what you are doing. LOL

See, we don't get the super-sexy new planes with the absolute top-end product flying from London-Heathrow to Dulles International Airport near Washington DC. We get the hand-me-downs after you guys flying into JFK have used 'em all up. 🤣 Just kidding, I've only made the trip twice in the last 10 years from DC to London and back (last one was business class about five years ago). It was actually very, very nice.

How did you get on a other virgin plane to do a announcement

LHR ground experience: Virgin LHR Lounge: Virgin Seat: Virgin (only if you get the rare ‘Retreat’ suit - Otherwise BA has a better overall product on their new suits. Food: Do&Co offer some of the best catering in the sky. I’ve had great and not so great meals on both Virgin & BA. So I’d say a tie on food with current catering. Service: BA is old school most of the time, Virgin more in your face style. Each to their own on this but for me Virgin edges it. Somewhat of an unfair comparison using a brand new VS plane and their ‘premium’ business seat compared with a 25 year old BA plane albeit retrofitted in a standard business seat. BA’s seat holds up and if it wasn’t a ‘Retreat’ seat I’d stick with BA. Virgins normal seat isn’t great.

Just discovered your channel and am loving all the videos, you’re all great! Would love to see a 4 cabin comparison on a Qantas flight (specifically QF1) Sydney to London.

Both carriers offer a solid product though I think Virgin Atlantic's overall airport experience was better. One is classier, the other more casual. In the end, a matter of personal preference provided schedule and airfares are comparable.

It’s great to see you again. You’ve been missed.

I think Virgin won 👠

Nicky and that FA banged later 🤣

Nicky should check out Frankfurt’s outdoor terrace it’s free and amazing with the occasional Lufthansa 747 parking next to it

Another compelling and informative head to head - well done team ! Really enjoy your unique content - no one does like you. If you want a lovely outside terrace experience, please don't ignore the Star Alliance Lounge at LAX's Tom Bradley Terminal. Yes there are massive construction works going on around the entire airport (they're building a flippin' monorail !). However this lounge is a little oasis - particularly in the evening. Thanks for doing what you do so we want to and stay positive. Hello from London :- ) xx

Great video I loved it! However I wish we’d see a Virgin Atlantic VS British Airways review but in BASIC ECONOMY! The cheapest tickets you can buy to see who offers the best bare bones product from say London to Washington DC! (LHR-IAD) How’s that sound? Fun right!! 😮 Also why did you compare the A330-900neo to the B777-300ER? A better comparison would’ve been the Virgin A330-900neo to the BA B787-9 Dreamliner! 🎉 Anyways great job as always and Cheers 🥂 mates! P.S. what Sony camera do you guys use? I’d love to know! Caleb’s Aviation

Thanks for the video. How tall are you guys? I’m a tall fella (6-8) so when you say ‘plenty of legroom’ it doesn’t mean a lot because if you’re 5 foot 4 then you’ll always have ‘plenty of legroom.’ Oh, and please stop telling people about the BA lounge at the B gate! It’s a secret. 😉

Love that you’re expanding channels. I really enjoy these vlogs.. thanks again for sharing these beautiful experiences with us.

I LOVE Nicky's sass in this one! Happy PRIDE, Mate - I look forward to the upcoming channels' content!

Do love watching you guys. . If your general joe spending around £10k each seat for a Business Class seat its just not worth it. Collect miles or Avios and you can save enough to have something in Business , Upper Class. I've even struggled with Premier Seats as ridiculous price on BA for NY, Orlando, etc. I've written to BA many times why they can't improve their food in world traveller , they always take it on board the feedback but same bland ew food Hope you had a good trip

Flown and like both. The Virgin clubhouse at Heathrow is awesome. The BA club suite is better than the Virgin option IMO, more privacy, more room and more comfortable. Food and drink wise pretty similar, but I think Virgin's service was better. Either is a great option if the price is right,

I think the B-Gate lounge is convenient for departure from those gates instead of worrying about the train from the main terminal, but it's not that nice IMHO so I wouldn't have done what Liam did.

AvTur......the smell of freedom.

why don't u try Myanmar National Airlines

Nice story and content. I have One suggestion. Duel for Airlines who offered SKYCOUCH OR SLEEPER SEAT. Example : Air New Zealand, China Airlines, Lufthansa, Azul and ANA etc.

Wow lucky boy Nicky!! I much prefer flying per Airbus as I do feel on long haul, that in the Boeing, I am almost in a coffin! 😅😮 GREAT reprts as usual (yeah I mean you Liam!).. Keep flying.. ALEX XX

Is there a planet full of Liams? I'm gonna go check for spaceship tickets 😂

I miss BA`s first on many of their routes and wish Virgin would not make such a big deal of their Upper class. Its most airlines` business class and slightly confused as a product.

Still, a point of criticism. Flying in Business/first class is not every ones goal. 85% of the people who watch this can probably not even afford the ticket and made me sad, Fly economy, as everyone else and not like a queen in business class weighing everything on a golden leaf whether it is all good or not , Please get yoour your feet back on the ground. . There are more people here watching this who really can't fly business/first class. It's nice to see but really you don't pay such a ticket yourself either, it said with miles or sponsored. It only becomes interested to me if it paid out of your own bank account. like me.

Bit of a false comparison given you both didn’t try both airlines. Assume the flights were sponsored respectively so you need to be nice to both. Shame you don’t conclude which is better for different tastes.. eg a business person wanting to go a-b in comforts vs a leisure traveller wanting a luxury experience…..

Good to give Nicky a rest for a few months as we knew he would be estatic re Virgin Atlantic. Bring back Jean for a more objective and colourful review experience!

Ok, the trek from T5B lounge menu to T5A is quite the walk of there's no buggy. You*Cannot* take the train.

Next video should be comparison between North South and B Gate lounge in LHR

While I would rather fly BA they both look excellent. Though I don’t think it was totally fair that virgin was in the retreat suite. Club suite is the standard product whereas the retreat suite is the niche “business plus” seat.

Interesting review greetings from the Netherlands

I’m not sure comparing the Retreat Suite with Club Suite is a balanced review