Japan Airlines Flight 407 from Narita to Frankfurt in Premium Economy
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After a long time of saving and pretending to diet, we finally got the chance to go to Europe again. As we are objectively old, this may be our last European trip for a long time, and I had an excess of American Airlines miles, we flew Premium Economy (hereafter not capitalized). We’d be flying PE on Japan Airlines from Narita Airport to Frankfurt, followed by a quick Business Class flight on British Airways to London City Airport.
We’d both flown on Japan Airlines before, but never in premium economy. JAL has a good reputation for decent seats and pretty good food (better than ANA, in our experience). How would this flight stack up?
JAL 407 NRT to FRA
Japan Airlines flight 407 leaves from Narita Airport, one of two major airports in Tokyo. We’ve flown out of both, and can’t really say there’s a ton of difference between them. Narita is far, but it’s easy to get to from our neighborhood because of the airport express train that leaves from Shibuya. After a short stay in the Sakura Lounge, we boarded on time for a flight scheduled to leave at 10:40. This was going to be a 14-hour flight, so we really hoped these seats would be comfortable.
Premium economy seats on JAL flight 407
Having never flown premium economy before on any airline, we didn’t totally know what to expect. The seats definitely seemed bigger than economy, but were’t gigantic. Maybe it’s because we’d walked past the impressive business class on the way there, but I was skeptical. We were in seats 19A & 19C, a window and aisle, with just the two of us on the left side of the plane.
We first noticed an issue when I tried to put my backpack under the seat in front of me and it didn’t fit. There was a rail right in the middle, so I could put my feet on either side of it, but my backpack wouldn’t fit. This meant it either had to go in the overhead bin (which I didn’t want because I wanted to access my medicine, headphones, and snacks), switch seats with Eriko (which we didn’t want because she likes the window and I have long legs so I like the aisle), or I had to put my backpack under the seat in front of her and she’d put her purse on my side, forcing me to ask her every time I wanted something from my bag like all the dried kiwi I’d made with my food dehydrator (which is what happened).
They provided a stacked amenity kit, along with a pillow, blanket, and slippers, as well as a gentle steam eye mask that I never used. My one problem with the amenity kits and pillows and such (and this extends to all flights, not just this one) was that there wasn’t anywhere to put the stuff until I needed it, so it just clogged near my feet until it was blanket time. That said, on a 14-hour flight, you’re going to want that blanket every now and then.
The first hour or two I listened to loud punk rock music and napped a bit. I woke up a bit sore, and was questioning whether these seats were worth it. After that, I stayed awake the entire time; I hoped to be tired when we finally reached London (didn’t work, never does, I always have jetlag). After a while, I got into a bit of a groove chilling and watching stuff on the seatback screen, and the flight was pretty painless.
The staff was great, bringing coffee when I asked for it and cleaning up after someone (not saying who) spilled green tea all over the floor in front of me. I found the seat was quite comfortable for such a long haul, and by the time we got to Frankfurt, I was really glad we’d chosen premium economy. I don’t think my body could handle a flight that long in economy anymore, and not just because I’m old now. I’m also fat.
In-flight entertainment on JAL 407 NRT-FRA
The first thing to which I would like to direct your attention is the flight status screen. You know, the section where you can look at an interactive map showing exactly where the plane is along its route. Well, look at the photo above that shows the intro screen where they explain how the map works: it features a sample screenshot of a map, and wouldn’t you know it, there’s Kearney, Nebraska, the town where I grew up. You’ve come a long way, Greggy.
The movie selection was pretty good. Since it was April, there were several awards-season pictures, as well as a lot of Neo-classics like Marvel movies, popular comedies, and Pixar. They must have a deal with Disney, because they also had The Mandalorian and a bunch of Disney TV shows.
One confusing thing was that some movies were listed two or three times. When we clicked on them, they seemed to be exactly the same, and it took a while for me to understand that what’s different is the subtitles. The first time the movie is listed, that’s the one with Japanese subtitles. The next listing or two is with other subtitles (for example, with Emilia Perez, the second one was English. For other movies, it was Chinese).
Eriko watched A Real Pain and told me it was really good. I watched it and agreed. She also said Conclave was really good. I watched Joker 2 instead because I’m a glutton for pain. I also watched Billy Joel at Madison Square Garden and absolutely did not cry during Piano Man and anyone who says I did is lying. Oh, and we watched British Bake-Off. We like watching things together on the plane because we’re a cute couple.
We wanted to watch Emilia Perez simultaneously, but when I started the movie, something got messed up. The control panel with the play and fast-forward buttons and all that stayed on screen, blocking the subtitles. When I tried to make that screen go away, it would pop back up a couple seconds later. I had to stop the movie.
When I went back to the movie selection screen, it went whooooooooooo, shooting through all the movies, not stopping until I turned off my screen. I listened to more angry punk rock because I couldn’t watch stuff.
Eriko eventually figured out what was happening: the screen was drifting, like Nintendo Switch Joy-Con controllers sometimes do. I didn’t get how that was possible. She pulled out my remote and showed me that on the back side, there was a joystick for the games. She moved it around in big circles and pulled it hard in one direction like we do to fix the Joy-Cons, and it worked. Unfortunately, there now wasn’t time to watch the movie before we landed. Oh, well.
In-flight dining on Japan Airlines in premium economy
For the first meal, we were given a choice between chicken or fish. I went with chicken, while Eriko went with fish. The chicken was covered in a less-than-appetizing green sauce that made me mistrustful of it. I have a very weak digestive system, and I often don’t trust airplane food. As such, I ate Eriko’s rice and my ice cream and she ate everything else. She said it was all good because she is easy to please.
Later, they brought around a tuna sandwich, which Eriko also said was good. The final meal we got prior to arrival was mochi barley rice with white sauce and meat sauce. Basically, it was rice covered with two sauces and a bunch of other stuff like edamame and pork. It came with a pretty tasty tofu salad and panna cotta, but the main dish was emblematic of what bothered me about the food.
Obviously, this was not business-class-quality food, and for Japan Airlines, I felt it wasn’t as good as what I’d had on previous economy flights. But what confused me was how complicated it was. Instead of rice with two different sauces, why not just give us pasta with meat sauce? Chicken and rice? A flight seems like a situation where one should keep it simple, but instead they had to get fancy. At least the orange juice was good, and I’d packed a lot of dried fruit and cookies.
Verdict: is premium economy worth it on JAL 407 NRT-FRA?
Yes, the remote drifting was annoying, the food was unexceptional, and having to put my backpack out of reach was an imposition, but what made this flight worthwhile was what I didn’t expect. Only having slept about an hour toward the beginning of the flight, one would think I’d be tired and sore upon arrival, as I usually am after a long flight like this. Instead, I felt refreshed and in a good mood, able to handle the annoyances of our stop in Frankfurt with the confusing boarding process and annoying finance-bro passengers on our British Airways flight to London. In short, the premium economy seats were absolutely worth it.
Side note: this is the first time I’d ever flown into LCY, and it was awesome. LHR is usually chaos going through passport control (I’ve waited more than an hour before), but at LCY, we got through in no joke two minutes.
I have no doubt that if we’d flown economy, my legs and feet would have been mush, I would have been tired and cranky, and the entire experience would have been worse. We’re now at the age where premium economy pays off, and after a flight this long, we were glad to have made the upgrade.
If you wanted to travel in April 2026, this flight is currently around $1,700 per person in premium economy when booked through the Japan Airlines website. An economy ticket is around $1,500. That means it’s just $200 to upgrade, a great deal if you’re going to be buying the economy flight anyway. But if you’re not already planning to go, $1,700 is a lot of money, and by the time you book, you may not be able to get the deal that’s available on my screen right now.
We booked with American Airlines miles, and paid 300,000 miles for our round trip (plus $400 or so in fees - don’t forget the fees when calculating value). That’s a premium economy flight to Frankfurt, business to London, and business all the way back to Japan. One might hope to get business all the way for that amount of miles, but we had specific days we wanted to fly and couldn’t find availability that worked for us. One could take this flight in economy for 35,000 AA miles, and to you it might not be worth it to fork over more than double that for premium economy. You have to do your own calculations based on what you value, and we’ve concluded that it was worth it for us. While we didn’t get the best use out of our miles from a financial standpoint, we definitely did from a make-this-vacation-count-because-who-knows-when-you’ll-be-able-to-do-this-again standpoint.
Ideally, you will never take a 14-hour flight from Narita to Frankfurt, because there are few reasons to do so. But if, like us, you’re going to take one, you can either pay for it or use miles. We prefer to use miles, and for us, it was worth it to use a lot of them to upgrade to premium economy because we had the miles to burn and it was part of a larger itinerary that mostly involved business class. For you, it may not be worth it. But if you’re already going to pay $1,500 for an economy ticket, forking over an extra $200 to get premium economy seats and arrive feeling refreshed is ABSOLUTELY a bargain. Treat yo’ self. It’ll feel good.
