French Bee, a low-cost long-haul airline based at Paris Orly Airport, offers the narrowest seats in the world at just 42.4cm wide, according to an analysis of publicly available plane specifications.
This is significantly narrower than the average Brit. The UK Health and Safety Executive's anthropometric data puts the average shoulder width for a UK adult at 48.8cm.
How French Bee fits more seats
French Bee has decided to load its aircraft with more seats, each smaller than average, to accommodate more passengers on board. On the standard A350, most airlines fly a 9-abreast (3-3-3) economy layout. French Bee instead squeezes in a 10-abreast (2-4-2 or 3-4-3) layout on its A350-1000s to maximize capacity. It's that extra seat per row that forces the width down to 42.4cm. Only the very rear of the cabin, where the fuselage narrows, reverts to the standard 3-3-3 layout.
For comparison, Air France, flying the same A350 family, uses the standard 9-abreast layout and offers 45.7cm. The width of the French Bee seats is particularly notable, given that the airline operates long-haul flights, typically trans-Atlantic. Most long-haul airlines have wider seats than their short-haul, budget rivals.
Seat comfort factors and comparisons
It's not just seat width that determines how comfortable it will be, however. The seat pitch, which is the distance from a specific point on one seat to the exact same point on the seat directly in front of or behind it, as well as the padding, contribute to overall comfort.
Airline seat sizes show French Bee at 42.4cm width with seat pitch unknown, while Ryanair offers around 43cm width with 71–97cm pitch, and British Airways around 43cm width with 74–79cm pitch. EasyJet provides 44.5–45.7cm width with around 74cm pitch, and United ranges from 43–44.5cm width with 76–81cm pitch depending on aircraft age.
Widest seats in the industry
According to most rankings, Japan Airlines has the widest seats of any commercial carrier. It repeatedly comes out on top across 2026 sources for the widest standard economy seats in the world. On its Boeing 787 "Sky Wider" cabins, JAL uses an unusual eight-abreast (2-4-2) layout instead of the industry-standard nine-abreast, sacrificing one seat per row to give passengers more room. Independent reviews have measured these seats at roughly 48–48.3cm wide.
