I Flew Oman Air’s “First Class” That No Longer Exists. Here’s the Truth

It Started With a Qatar Downgrade

The original plan was a good one. Qatar Airways A380 First Class via Doha to Muscat: one last go on the A380 before Qatar retires it for the 777X, a stretch in the legendary Al Safwa First Class Lounge, and a late spring trip to Oman, a country I’ve been wanting to revisit for a while

Then Iran was attacked, again, end of Feb. The wider Middle East situation prompted airlines to start shuffling their metal with little fanfare. Qatar pulled their A380s from certain Heathrow rotations with 777s. The choice was: accept a downgrade to Business, or rebook. I rebooked.

What I ended up with was a direct flight to Muscat on Oman Air WY102, in a cabin with a little identity crisis. Until 2024, this was Oman Air’s First Class product. Then they retired the name, rebranded it as Business Suites, and hoped everyone would quietly adjust. Qatar’s booking system, apparently, did not get the memo. It still calls it First Class. Oman Air’s own website says the product doesn’t exist. Both, technically, are telling the truth.

I’ve flown the old Oman Air First Class twice. This was my first time with the rebranded version. The suite is the same. The question this whole review comes down to is what, if anything, changed along with the name. As it turns out, the answer begins at the check-in desk.

Signs of Differentiation, Or So I Thought.

I arrived at Terminal 4 three and a half hours before our evening departure to find the Premium check-in lanes busier than Economy…

Most of the people in them, it turned out, were not flying Business Suites. Some were in standard Business Class. The branding confusion, it seems, starts at the check-in desk.

After about five minutes, a ground crew member approached me directly, confirmed I was in Business Studios, took my ID, and checked me in on the spot while everyone else was still faffing about with bags. Efficient, personal, premium.

I filed that moment away with a small sense of optimism. Maybe, I thought, this cabin still gets treated differently. Maybe the rebrand still meant a genuine service differentiation. It was a comforting thought.

I will return to how that theory held up.

Qatar Premium Lounge: Still Lovely, Still Unchanged

Oman Air doesn’t have a lounge at Heathrow, so Business Suites passengers use the Qatar Premium Lounge at Terminal 4, alongside Business Class passengers from other oneworld carriers. Given that Oman Air joined oneworld in 2024, this is now a properly established arrangement rather than a quirk.

I’ve been visiting this lounge since 2018 and its most remarkable quality is how stubbornly identical it looks each time. Seven years, four visits, not a single orchid out of place. It is either a tribute to timeless interior design or a sign that a refresh is long, long overdue. Almost certainly both. For a full write-up, see my updated Qatar Premium Lounge review here.

In brief: the food is good, the Martini Bar is excellent and properly attentive, and the restaurant service on this visit was curiously absent between courses despite at least three waiters being audible chatting somewhere nearby. Not quite the Qatar standard. 

Oman Air Business Studio: Beautifully Omani

Boarding was onetime and well handled. No First Class escort on boarding, which already tells you something. I made my own way through the forward Oman Air Business Class cabin (an APEX Suites ) and into the Suites cabin at the front.

Just one other passenger in the entire cabin when the door closed, later joined by a last-minute upgrade from Business. 

The cabin design remains one of the more distinctive in the sky. There’s an unmistakably Omani quality to it: warm tones, considered materials, the kind of detailing that suggests someone actually thought about where this aircraft was going rather than just what tier it was flying.

It still looks gorgeous. It feels like somewhere rather than something.

The suite itself is spacious, genuinely private, and not far removed from what you’d find in Swiss Senses First Class in terms of sheer footprint and feel of luxury. That is not faint praise.

Where it shows its age is the IFE screen, framed by an enormous bezel that could generously be described as retro and less generously as a waste of perfectly good display real estate. 

Worth Knowing Before You Board

There are no overhead bins in this cabin at all. Zero. The crew stow your carry-on elsewhere. When I flew the old First Class, I was escorted and my bag disappeared seamlessly.

This time, with no escort, the gap was obvious: a full-size carry-on has absolutely nowhere to go in the suite itself. Only a smaller backpack fits under the ottoman. Not a dealbreaker, just something to know before you wheel a rollaboard confidently into row 2.

The suite has a chilled minibar tucked into the console, stocked with still water, sparkling water, and sodas. It reads as a thoughtful touch and turns out to be a quietly essential one. More on that shortly.

Controls are intuitive, storage is genuinely ample, and there’s a full-length coat cupboard.

The ottoman doubles as a buddy seat for dining, with bedding stored underneath, which means it won’t substitute as luggage storage either. The suite was clearly designed by someone who had actually slept in one.

An Oman Air Business Dinner Affair

Dine-on-demand is properly executed here.

Welcome drinks and Arabic coffee ( even if late ) was offered on the ground followed by a post take off drinks service.

Suliman, my crew member for the flight and a genuinely warm presence throughout, checked I was ready before setting the table, arriving only then with the full setup.

No tray appearing uninvited while you’re mid-film. This is how it should work and it’s worth calling out when it does.

The menu reads well. Crispy duck, pistachio-crusted lamb rack, a proper Omani selection.

I would genuinely have ordered everything on it. The catch is that the selection has been visibly reduced compared to three years ago. Four starters, four mains, a proper cheese plate, a leather-bound menu card: all gone.

What remains is still good, just shorter, and you feel it.

I went fully Omani, which I’d partially revise in hindsight. Here’s a genuine tip worth passing on: the Omani dishes are a little better when flying out of Muscat. The kitchen cooks best when it’s cooking for home. Flying London to Muscat, the Western options are probably good as any top airline !

For starters, Sherbet Harees (slow-cooked Omani soup)

Warming and honest 6/10 and Smoked kingfish, surprisingly dense and meaty, though the chickpea salad listed on the menu did not materialise 7/10

For main, Omani Qaliya (lamb)

fragrant, rich, generally excellent 9/10

then Baked qunafa with mint tea 

a fitting close to the meal

One slightly loose service moment: red wine arrived before dinner was even confirmed, which I hadn’t requested. Suliman was attentive throughout, so I chalk this up to service flow rather than individual inattentiveness. But it’s the sort of thing that would not happen in a more tightly run premium cabin operation.

The First Class Bed: The Strongest Argument for Booking This Cabin

After my film finished, I asked Suliman to make my bed, the the Suite across in 2G. The luxury of having multiple Suites in a First Class cabin, is a real flex !

I came back from the bathroom to this immaculate setup…

Sleeping in this suite is genuinely, properly good. The seat base is deeply padded and the mattress topper doesn’t need to do much heavy lifting. Together they create a comfortable, spacious flat bed.

Suite doors closed, cabin dark, curtains drawn: three and a half hours on a seven-hour overnight. 

Pyjamas are the same full-length set from the former First Class product: comfortable, British Airways territory rather than Emirates or Etihad. The Amuage amenity content’s were equally good – if nothing extraordinary..

I slept well for about 3 and half hours – if the flight was 15 hour, I could have easily slept for 8 hours !

Here’s where the minibar earns its mention. I woke 45 minutes before landing, mildly thirsty as one tends to be after a few hours of recycled cabin air. The crew were already deep into landing preparations and nobody was coming through the cabin.

I reached into the console, chose between still and sparkling, and sorted myself out in about four seconds. Trivial, yes. But it’s also the kind of detail that separates a First Class Suite from a bog standard Business class.

The one genuine miss: at no point in the flight did anyone proactively offer breakfast. Not before sleep, not on descent, not at any point with 45 minutes still to run. British Airways First Class crew, for all their well-documented shortcomings elsewhere, would offer without being asked.

On a recent Ethiopian Airlines flight into London, I was offered a full hot breakfast 25 minutes before landing. Ethiopian Airlines. A product several tiers below what Oman Air is charging for this cabin. If that airline can manage it, this one has no excuse.

On Flying to the Middle East Right Now

There was a low-level awareness in the background heading to this flight. The wider regional situation in the Middle East has been real and serious throughout 2025, and anyone who says they don’t clock that before a trip in this direction isn’t being entirely honest.

But Oman is a genuinely different proposition. It is the Switzerland of the Middle East: neutral, stable, and one of the most welcoming countries I have visited. The paradox is quietly extraordinary. This is a nation sitting mere miles from the Strait of Hormuz, one of the most critical chokepoints for global energy and shipping on the planet. Tensions elsewhere in the region have been significant. From inside Oman, you would never know. Landing felt calm, safe, and completely unhurried. It is absolutely worth visiting, particularly right now.

Remember that moment at check-in, being pulled aside personally while everyone else shuffled through the queue? It felt like a signal: this cabin gets looked after differently. Across 3,500 miles and seven hours, here is what that actually amounted to. A better seat, the same food, the same service flow, and one proactive gesture that never came at all. The check-in was not a preview of a different product. It was the highlight of one.

Oman Air Business Suites is a product in a quiet identity crisis. The suite is genuinely excellent, competitive with some of the best hard products in Business and First Class. But the service wrapped around it has retreated to standard Business Class levels, and in places slightly below where Oman Air Business itself was a few years ago. 

I’ve held Oman Air in genuinely high regard for years and I’ll continue to fly them. But this flight took a little of that shine off. 

Next up: Oman Air Business Class on a regional flight, and the Business Lounge in Muscat. A rather different experience is coming.