The Saudi Arabian Airlines Experience

Last month I had to book a flight to the states in quite a last minute basis, we looked around and somehow i ended up in the Saudi Airlines page. 

I read some review on some Arabic forums but couldn’t really get a lot of information and they only downside that was to it was that they said it sometimes really got delayed, other than that no one mentioned anything about the quality. 

Lets start from the most important question, was it cheap/expensive ?

It was average, for a flight from Kuwait to Washington (IAD) they had a good offer which compared to KLM and United was the cheapest you can get + they had more reservation timings which were a lot more suitable for us. 

Route options : 

That was the main hiccup in our journey, the plane has to go through Riyadh or Jeddah Airport, which based on our experience was a little tiresome. We had to stay 9 hours in Riyadh (booked in Qurtoba furnished apartments – very new and clean – will review soon). Then unannounced we somehow transited into Jeddah (which was totally not on the flight manifest when we booked) and then we headed to the states. The total trip time was the same, but they did not mention we will be transiting into Jeddah. 

The return flight was totally opposite, we flew from IAD to Riyadh and 2-2.5 hours transit in Riyadh and directly to Kuwait, it was a lot more comfortable. 

Spacing:

Economy seats were quite spacious (compared to KLM and United) and the legroom was good : 

Food: 

The food was another advantage, you’d guarantee it was islamic and cooked in the same manner as it would be in the region + it actually was ok!

The Entertainment: 

Well, from Kuwait to Saudi and Saudi To kuwait, there was no entertainment, because the plane was as big as a bus, no screens at all. But from Kuwait to the states and back i was quite amazed at the quality of the movies they had and the amount of new movies. One other thing i really liked was that they censored the movies! I though this was a great advantage Especially on a plane, where there might be a child or a very conservative person that might be annoyed sitting next to you, you can watch a movie without having to worry. 

One more nice gesture were the children’s gifts sets and airplane kits which they gave out for free for all the children, very nice of them and showed they really cared, my kids loved them  :

I would highly recommend SA Airlines to anyone, however you have to check the travel times and transit wait times, as this can either make it a good opportunity or really a very bad experience. It would be nice if they had shorter wait times Saudi Arabia, but other than that they were really good, going through KSA was also easy and Riyadh airport was ok (might even be better than Kuwait airport in terms of size and cleanliness). If you have any questions, please feel free to ask!