Flights to Saudi capital will be exclusively flown with the refurbished, four-class cabin
Dubai-based airline Emirates is extending the rollout of its retrofitted Boeing 777s to Riyadh in Saudi, with all three daily flights being served by the four-cabin aircraft.
The Saudi capital was the first city in the region to welcome the new 777 in October 2024, and the second and third daily flights will follow from 30 March and 7 May 2025.
Initially, the third service will be flown by the refurbished 777 six flights a week before going daily from 11 August 2025.
Riyadh will become the first city in the GCC to be served exclusively by the retrofitted aircraft
Boeing 777 Premium Economy
The Emirates Boeing 777 entered refurbishment in early July and debuted in August 2024 on a flight to Geneva, with Brussels, Zurich, Vienna and Athens also added. Routes serving Seoul in South Korea and London Stansted in the UK will follow in April and May 2025, respectively.
The refurbishment took 37 days and around 10,000 hours.
The new configuration has 24 Premium Economy seats in a 2-4-2 layout, with 19.5-inch-wide cream leather seats. The Business Class cabin offers 38 seats in a 1-2-1 configuration, with seats converting to flatbeds. The new Economy Class has 256 seats.
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First Class features fully enclosed suites with floor-to-ceiling doors for total privacy and middle seats include virtual windows for exterior views.
Emirates had originally planned to give 191 Boeing 777 and Airbus A380 aircraft a full facelift, but that number has increased to around 220, airline president Tim Clark said at ITB Berlin in March 2025. Delays in deliveries of new aircraft from manufacturers like Boeing left Emirates with “no choice” as it spends US$5 billion on the upgrades.
In November 2024, Emirates also introduced chauffeur services for First and Business Class passengers, the first airline to offer this benefit.
Emirates operates 72 weekly flights to all four destinations in Saudi Arabia.
For more information, visit www.emirates.com
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