If you’re considering a trip to Thailand from North America via Thai Airways, you’ve no doubt been trying to work out the various classes of service. Unlike more traditional flights, with economy, business and first classes, the direct flights started a little over a year ago still offer three classes, but call them economy, “premium economy” and “royal silk” class. Economy class may be easy enough – cramped seating and limited movie choices – although at least there is a movie choice on the Thai flights. But, what is “premium economy”, or “royal silk” for that matter? Owing to a lack of upgrade seats in royal silk for my outbound leg, I had a chance to sample both classes on a recent trip to the US.

I was in premium economy on a flight from Bangkok to Los Angeles. The section was surprising small, with less than 10 rows of seats in a two-three-two configuration. The seats are only slightly wider than economy, but further apart. The seats do have an electronically controlled foot rest, but do not really recline very far. Since I’m not one who can easily sleep on planes, I didn’t get much rest on the flight, but, since the plane arrives in LA at 9:30 at night, sleeping during the flight wasn’t really a good idea in the first place. I arrived in LA very tired, had a good night’s sleep, and was able to enjoy the rest of my trip with almost no jet lag. If you run out of movies to watch and want to get some work done, there is a power point between seats that will keep your battery charged for the long trip.

My return to Bangkok was in royal silk class. Royal silk is perhaps meant to be a little better than your typical business class, but not quite first class. The rows of seats are indeed quite far apart. Although not quite as wide as business class seats I’ve experienced in the past, they do almost fully recline, meaning you can lie almost flat. Since the return flight departs LA late at night and arrives in Bangkok early in the morning, you definitely want to get some sleep if you can. There’s also a power point at each seat (although I noted that only one of the power points in each pair of seats could be used at a time), as well as an “over-the-shoulder” reading light. The seats have a rather complicated set of controls to adjust the recline, foot rest, and even the lumbar support.

In conclusion, I would highly recommend the royal silk class when flying to Bangkok, but premium economy was more than adequate for flying from Bangkok to the US.