The world-class Qatar Airways Q – Suites Business Class Cabin has changed the way people travel in business class all over the world. Some have stated that the Qatar Airways Q Suites are so luxurious, that a first class cabin is unnecessary. We would find ourselves in the Q Suites cabin on our return trip with Qatar Airways on a fourteen-hour flight from the Middle East to the West Coast of the United States . We would get a chance to experience every Qatar amenity and service on our flight. How would our flight measure up to these high standards?

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This post is one chapter on my trip to the Republic of the Maldives. This trip was enhanced through Marriott Bonvoy Elite Status, Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan and Air Canada’s Aeroplan. For more information on how this trip was booked, please see our trip introduction. For other parts of the trip, please see this index.

If you enjoyed this post, please follow us here or on social media through Facebook, Twitter or Instagram for more travel tips and hacks on how to “Upgrade Your Travels”.

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Review: Qatar Airways Q Suites Business Class A350-1000, Doha Hamad International Airport – San Francisco International Airport

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“Qatar Airways Q Suites has transformed international business class into a supremely private travel setting, accompanied with that world class wine list, terrific sleeping amenities in a cuddle class double bed”

This flight is of travels on Qatar Airways Q Suites Business Class Doha – San Francisco. For the return journey, please see our separate review of Qatar Airways Q Suites Business Class San Francisco – Doha.

Checking into Qatar Airways:

After spending a pleasant layover at the Westin Doha Hotel and Spa on a nine hour connection, we took an Uber back to the airport.

We were dropped off near the Qatar Airways First and Business Class check in near Door #1 at Hamad International Airport. The Qatar Airways Premium check in area at Doha is exceptionally opulent, with an excess of space to maneuver and with minimal crowding.

Inside the Qatar Airways Business Class check in, I asked an attendent for a cool Qatar Airways Business Class plastic luggage tag. The staff weren’t so keen to give them out, referencing that they were for “checked baggage only”. We didn’t happen to see any in the outstations at San Francisco or at Malé.

We didn’t take the offer of the paper baggage tag and ended up leaving quickly to avoid getting our carry on baggage weighed. It was likely over the light Qatar Airways 15lbs carry on limit.

We walked straight through to the dedicated departure exit immigration gates. Our Canadian passports did not work at the e-Gates, so we queued for the sole immigration officer working at 5 AM for a digital photograph on the way out.

We passed through the dedicated First and Business Class security screening which seemed to take issue with my keys, camera and cable cords in my laptop bag. We were underway after a few minutes.

Visiting the Qatar Al Mourjan Lounge:

After security, we headed onto collect a Fifa 2022 World Cup soccer ball for my nephew, and onto the Qatar Airways Al Mourjan Business Lounge for some breakfast.

I reviewed the Qatar Airways Al Mourjan Business Lounge on our way through earlier, so I won’t do so again. It remained a comfortable place to relax.

We wandered upstairs to the restaurant. I was able to enjoy pre-flight breakfast with Eggs Royale; salmon eggs benny with unbranded pink champagne Charles Drappier.

At about forty five minutes prior to our flight, we headed over to Gate C8. Cate C8 was reasonably close to the lounge. Like many gates along this bank designed to service flights to the united states, it was a secure hold facility.

A recent announcement indicated that there was a flight delay. As a result in order to kill off some time, we walked up the concourse to the new Doha Hamad International Airport Garden structure

We eventually returned to Gate C8 near many other flights departing around the same time for the United States. These included Qatar Airways service to Philadelphia, Washington, Miami, Seattle, New York among many others.

Boarding Qatar Airways:

We entered into the secure holding area at Gate C8. We had a secondary security screening along with a laptop swabbing for explosives.

There wasn’t a lot of space inside the secure gate area. Qatar Airways boarded First, Business Class, and those needing extra time to board all at once. Qatar Airways actually made efforts at managing the line for those on Group 3 trying to board with First & Business. It was mini mayhem for about five minutes getting on.

Qatar Airways had proper double jet bridge boarding today in Doha. We were able to glide down a separate jet bridge for business class to get on board Qatar Airways Q Suites cabin.

Qatar Airways
Business Class
DOH-SFO (Doha Hamad International Airport – San Francisco International Airport “A” Gates)
QR 737
Flown: March 21, 2023
Departure: 8:10 AM
Arrival: 1:40 PM
Booked: Airbus 350-1000
Flown: Airbus 350-1000

On Board Qatar Airways Q Suites Business Class:

After the disorganized boarding process, we boarded at Door L1 and entered in to the Qatar Airways Q Suites Business Class Cabin. Qatar Airways had its boarding music playing, which sets a traditional, understated, but elegant middle eastern mood.

On board, I located my centre facing rear seat at 3E. The Qatar Airways Q Suite purple cabin is elegant looking and offers a contemporary look with modern colours.

Qatar Airways offers a combination of seating throughout its Q Suites Cabin. The Qatar Airways Business Class Cabin offers seating in either a 1 – 2 – 1 configuration with separated middle seats (branded as a Twin Q Suite), or a 1 – 2 – 1 configuration with joined middle seats (branded a Double Q Suite). The outer single seats facing the windows are branded as a Single Q Suite.

The Double Q Suite:

Our seating reservation had us in the Twin Q Suite in the middle bank at Row 3. Booking the combination of joined Twin or Double Q Suites (in the middle) requires a call to the Qatar Airways Reservation Centre. Although the privacy wall was up on our arrival, we would get the opportunity to lower it later in the flight.

The Qatar Airways Q Suites offer a double walled suite with sliding doors. The space offered with the Qatar Airways Q Suites rivals some International First Class cabins with the amount of privacy that is offered.

It is worth mentioning that all of the Double Q Suites face rearwards towards the back of the plane. While this may bother some, I didn’t find it all that bad with the difference noticed during take off and landing.

The Qatar Q Suites Business Class Cabin does not offer overhead bins storage above the centre seats. With no storage bins over the centre seats, the outer bins can get a a little fuller than some other business class cabins. We didn’t have any storage issues, we just didn’t have a storage bin all to ourselves.

Sitting into the Q Suite, the suite itself offers wide twenty six inch entertainment monitors, and a remarkably interconnected space when the middle privacy screen is lowered.

There is a small shelf available for storage of items such as passports or wallets.

Each suite offers a walled space that is highly functional. The seat offers a small adjacent space for articles, in addition to a small table for storage.

Each seat has a reading light that is located above your shoulder. It offers a variety of lighting options from dim to full spot light.

The foot rest well offered a somewhat compact space. While you won’t store anything here, it was a comfortable rest for your feet. I did find the space a little compact in nature, and especially challenging for tall side sleepers like me.

There was a comfortable pillow and blanket waiting for us at the seat. The Qatar Airways blanket is remarkably comfortable and plush in its purple colour.

On our seat, a pillow with a Qatar Airways slip cover was waiting for us. The slogan “Beautiful Destinations often lead to everlasting memories” was travel oriented, but it appealed to MrsWT73.

The Amenity Kit:

Qatar Airways has partnered with Diptyque Parfumeur Paris for its amenity kits. Qatar Airways describes these as “Offering signature fragrances inside each amenity kit, premium passengers will receive signature body and face care products designed to elevate the senses, packaged beautifully in elegant Diptyque branded amenity bags and luxurious bespoke gift boxes”.

While we got one of the bespoke gift boxes on the way out, we received a more practical bag on this time around. It contained the same contents as the box.

Inside the box, there were several Diptyque products including Fresh Hand Cream, Essential Face Cream and Nourishing Lip Palm.

Qatar Airways Pyjamas by The White Company:

Qatar Airways provides pyjamas for all of it’s business class customers on overseas flights that have a night time component. The current provider for Qatar Airways Business Class is The White Company. We’ve also seen these pyjamas on British Airways First Class. I would stock up on a large set of pyjamas for this particular day time flight.

The pjyamas were loose fitting and appropriately sized. As a 187 cm person (6ft 2 inches) with an athletic build, I easily fit a large size. Given the long fourteen hour flight, I used the pjyamas and found them very comfortable for a long haul flight.

Pre-Departure Services:

Qatar Airways offered a purser introduction while we settled in waiting for departure. Qatar Airways opens their great champagne while on the ground at Doha International Airport. Today’s champagne was the outrageously expensive Champagne Alexandra Laurent Perrier Rosé 2016, currently retailing for $500 USD a bottle. I am happy to report that the champagne was also properly chilled; something that didn’t happen in Malé even at altitude.

A towel service was also provided. The towel service was provided in a wrapped container, which was again a slightly low rent, but pandemic safe touch.

The Dinner Menu:

While we were waiting to depart San Francisco, the menus were dropped off. Qatar Airways offers an impressive and showy dinner menu and wine list printed on elegant paper stock.

Today’s flight was split into two meal services. With the flight departing at 8:10 AM, the first meal service was a breakfast offering. This was followed by a second service that was a dinner styled supper offering.

As always, Qatar Airways has an excellent wine list. Today’s wine list offered something for everyone from both old world and new world parts of the wine world.

For those not interested in wine, there were also some cocktails, spirits (including Grey Goose Vodka) and whisky available.

Our first course food order was taken on the ground while we were in Doha.

There was more than enough food and wine available on this flight. Qatar Airways lived up to its reputation as having quality food and beverage giving it’s travellers something to look forward to on this particular flight.

Oryx One In Flight Entertainment:

Qatar Airways offers an excellent world class entertainment system called Oryx One. The entertainment is delivered through a twenty six inch monitor, which is class leading for business class cabins.

Before we got underway, I took a look at the Oryx flight map which showed our flight time and distance to our destination of San Francisco.

We also had the in flight safety video play. One of the advantages of having such an expansive route network is that there are many places such as Los Angeles and Cape Town, where you can film your in flight videos.

The Qatar Airways Oryx One entertainment system has a large number of movies. With an international audience, Oryx One separates the movies in to Hollywood, Arabic, Bollywood and African categories.

Qatar Airways also offered wifi on board our flight from Doha to San Francisco. The pricing was at $10 USD for a full flight, or a free hour for Qatar Airways Privilege Club Members.

I didn’t test out the speed, but it remained an option in the event you absolutely needed to stay connected.

Departing Doha Hamad Internatonal Airport:

We were about one hour late pushing back from the gate at Doha Hamad International Airport. The pilot announced that there would be an effort to make up some time during the journey.

We taxied out to Runway 34R and departed Doha International Airport. Based on a combination of camera angles, we were able to set up a nice set of camera angles as we left Qatar.

The Meal: A Full Breakfast Service

Shortly after we took off, the meal service was offered. Given that we had eaten in the Qatar Airways Al Mourjan Lounge, and with fourteen hour flight ahead of us, we opted to eat about two hours into the flight.

I started off with Fresh Orange Juice. It was terrific and mostly pulp free with a punch. The first course was Home Made Mango Yoghurt; with contained seeds on top. It was presented with a fresh assorted bread basket.

For the main course, I went with a California Omelette with Ricotta, Avocado and Roasted Tomato. Surprisingly, it was not the best dish by Californian standards and was a little little processed tasting.

I finished breakfast at about the three hour mark into the flight while we were passing over the Black Sea with Azerbaijan on the right.

Sleeping in Qatar Airways Q Suites:

Qatar Airways Q Suites offers an excellent sleep experience that rivals the worlds best business class. Qatar Airways offers full mattress pads, a sleep sheet along with fluffy purple blankets.

After breakfast, I called the flight attendant to have the bed made up. The space was converted into a Double Q Suite sleeping area. The combination is one of the few double beds in the sky; perfect for cuddling with your travel partner.

Settling into the sleeping portion of the Q Suite, we still had almost ten hours to go.

I changed into The White Company sleep sets. The turn down service provided a thin mattress pad and puffy purple blanket.

The footwell was tiny and not as comfortable flying westwards. During the sleep time, there were many sounds of dining throughout the cabin and clinking of cutlery which didn’t make it as restful a sleep. Flying westward it was also less conducive to a good nights sleep with the gradual shift in time zones.

I ended up sleeping from 11: 00 AM until about 6:30 PM. Given the jet lag, I had a light sleep with substantial turbulence.

In terms of sleep quality, as I had mentioned previously, the seat itself was quite firm. I would say that it was about eight out of ten on the firmness scale. This was great for a performance car, but a little firm for a comfortable sleep.

There were no air jets nozzles in the centre of the cabin, which made for a little bit of a hot cabin when you’re ensconced in the sheets, fluffy blankets and pillows.

The Second Service: Dinner

At about two hours before landing, I ordered the second meal service. The table was immediately set with Qatar’s white table cloth, tea light, water service and assorted bread basket.

The first course was a Burrata Tomato Carpaccio with rosemary fried black olives, olive oil and balsamic dressing. It was tasty although all the flavours went together ok. Surprisingly, the tomatoes were a little wilted and without much flavour or sharpness.

MrsWT73 enjoyed a Qatar’s version of classic Arabic Mezze platter. While it was a solid dish, it wasan’t as impressive as the ones that you find in Emirates First Class.

For a second course, I enjoyed a Broccoli Miso Soup. It was presented as a little lukewarm although it was flavourful and I could taste the broccoli more than the miso tastes. I paired this with Chardonnay Penfolds Bin 311, Australia; it was good and balanced wine and went well with the starters.

For the main course, I went with a chargrilled lamp kofta and a lamb chop, tomato focaccia, white aubergine and harissa oil.

Of the two meat dishes, the lamb kofta was better than the lamp chop. The chop was fully cooked and a little gristly. It was a good combination of flavours although given the jet lag, I wasn’t super hungry or have a lot of appetite.

I finished the four course meal with fresh berries and fruit with sour cream. This was the freshest part of the meal, which wasn’t up to Qatar’s usual excellent standards. Despite being interesting and engaging, the meal tasted as if it wasn’t as fresh as it could be.

I had a towel service to finish the meal and the last towel service of this particular trip.

Our flight wound down, having almost reached our final destination of San Francisco. We were lastly presented with some Läderach Swiss Chocolates to enjoy or take away with us.

Landing at San Francisco International Airport:

It happened to be raining in San Fransico on our arrival. The state of California was undergoing an atmospheric river of rain, which caused some visibility and wind issues on our final approach.

After a go around on the descent, we ended up in a massive holding pattern while the airport switch up runways to a cross runway.

We ended up in a slip coming down towards the San Francisco runway. We landed safely on the runway. We were about twenty minutes late arriving to the gate.

We arrived to a very wet and rainy San Francisco over in the San Francisco International “A” Gates Terminal.

We promptly disembarked and headed off towards US Customs and Immigration. We were through without any delay courtesy of Global Entry.

We headed over to United Airlines to check in for a United Airlines Business Class San Francisco – Vancouver flight back home

My Thoughts on Qatar Airways Q Suites Business Class:

Qatar Airways Q Suites is arguably the world’s best business class. The seating configuration is among the best in the world, and it’s paired with an excellent world class menu and wine list.

Today’s flights’ food was a little less fresh. It felt as little wilted by comparison. Despite this, I really enjoyed the flight and wouldn’t hesitate to get back on a Qatar Airways Q Suites flight again in the near future.

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If you’ve flown Qatar Airways Q Suites Business Class, did it live up to being one of your favourite business class air travel experiences ?

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