United Airlines used the morning of April 24 to release something the points-and-miles community has been requesting for two years: a firm date, a firm aircraft, and a firm route for the launch of its Polaris 2.0 business class.

In a release issued at 7:00 am Eastern, with Andrew Nocella (Chief Commercial Officer) and Toby Enqvist (Chief Customer Officer) on a 9:00 am call with analysts and select media including Business Class Journal, the carrier confirmed the following:

  • First flight: August 1, 2026, on flight UA 837 from San Francisco (SFO) to Tokyo Haneda (HND), departing at 11:35 am, registered N29985.
  • Aircraft: Boeing 787-9, with 48 Polaris 2.0 suites in a 1-2-1 herringbone configuration, replacing the existing 48-seat Polaris 1.0 cabin.
  • Retrofit pace: 11 aircraft delivered with the new cabin by December 31, 2026; a further 42 aircraft retrofitted in 2027; the full 130-aircraft 787 and 777-300ER long-haul fleet completed by Q4 2027.
  • Program cost: USD 4.2 billion confirmed on the analyst call, of which USD 1.7 billion was already booked in 2025 capital expenditure.

What’s actually different

The Polaris 2.0 hard product, supplied by Safran Seats GB (the same Cwmbran, Wales factory that builds the British Airways Club Suite), uses a re-engineered version of the original Polaris seat.

Doors. The headline change. Each suite has a sliding privacy door that closes flush at the top — a configuration United specifically benchmarked against Singapore’s recently announced A350-1000 product (see our coverage on April 15) rather than against Qatar’s Qsuite, which has a known gap.

Bed length. 198 cm fully flat, up from 196 cm on Polaris 1.0. The bed itself is built on a different shell that allows the foot cubby to extend further into the seat in front; the result is that 6’5” passengers no longer have to wedge their feet at an angle, a complaint that has dogged the original Polaris since 2017.

The wireless charging surface. United has gone further than any current premium-cabin product on this: the entire side-console surface, 38 cm by 24 cm, is a Qi 2 wireless charging area. You can drop your phone, your AirPods, your Apple Watch, or your second device onto any part of the surface and they will charge.

Screen. A 22-inch 4K OLED, manufactured by LG Display in South Korea, replacing the 16-inch panel on Polaris 1.0. The bezel is significantly slimmer, and Bluetooth 5.3 audio pairing is enabled at launch.

Cabin density. Same. United is keeping the 48-seat configuration on the 787-9 and 50 seats on the 777-300ER. There was speculation in late 2025 that the carrier might thin the cabin to push prices higher; Nocella confirmed on the call that this was never on the table.

The questions United did not answer

Polaris lounges. The current Polaris lounge network — eight US cities, plus Tokyo Narita — is showing capacity strain at peak hours, and the SFO and EWR lounges are particularly stressed. Asked whether the lounge product would receive a corresponding refresh in 2026, Enqvist said only that “we are evaluating expansion in two markets” without naming them. Industry chatter points to LAX (where the existing Polaris lounge in Terminal 7 is undersized) and ORD (where the Polaris lounge has not had a meaningful refresh since 2019).

MileagePlus saver award levels. The carrier did not commit to holding current Polaris saver award rates after the cabin transition. United’s MileagePlus program has shifted toward dynamic pricing on most routes since 2019, and the gap between saver and standard awards has narrowed materially. Loyalty editor Jonas Reinholt’s full breakdown of the implications will publish on Business Class Journal next week.

Delta and American response. Delta One is in the middle of its own A350 refresh, and American Airlines confirmed in February that its 787-9 Flagship Suite Preferred would not be retrofitted to the existing 777-300ER fleet. American thus enters 2027 with the oldest US business class hard product among the big three.

The first revenue Polaris 2.0 flight, UA 837 SFO-HND on August 1, is now bookable. Cash fares for the inaugural day are showing USD 5,820 one-way; saver awards have not yet loaded.