Aeroflot

I flew Aeroflot from NYC to Bangkok with a layover in Moscow each way. They were decent, but the plan on the way to Bangkok was much nicer than the one on the way back. Either way, the stewardesses were cordial and helpful but as one might expect from a Russian airline, they aren’t exactly warm. The food was difficult for me… being two of the few non-​Russians on the plane, my sister and I were not into the food but everyone else seemed to find it good. On the flight back we refused food, though. Everything is cured meats and heavy stews and random slaws… even in the morning. It was way too heavy and the consistencies were meh. I just loaded up on food at the airports before, during layovers and upon landing. Good movie selection, seats were average comfort… no complaints. Clean cabins. It’s not a luxury airline but it’s not bottom of the barrel either as some of these reviews suggest. If you fly first class it’s not worth spending the extra money on this airline but it was pretty okay.

Flying from NY to UKRAINE has been a good experience with Aeroflot airlines.
Wish I could give more than 5 stars to this company.
Cheap tickets, absolutely great costumer service, fresh food and tasty drinks. It is one of the few airlines where you can try the tomatoes juice on aboard.
Defiantly recommend this airlines .
Fly with Aeroflot and takes one of the most enjoyable in recent memory!!!

BAD, BAD. used it twice in 10 years. First time all my presents were stolen (about $ 2000 worth). Second time lost baggage. W.A.F. Russian airline which is F… King Aeroflot is suuuuuucks.

Aeroflot offered a great flight experience. I was able to travel from different continents to my destination with ease and the lay-​overs were reasonable. The prices for the flights were unbeatable. Overall I would recommend Aeroflot as a reliable, affordable flight.

When I bought my tickets they were for the wrong day. So I canceled the tickets within 24 hours (website lists this as the cutoff for full refund). Called Moscow and they said that for a refund I had to contact the NY office. I tried many times but was never able to speak with anyone (or leave a message) so I sent an email requesting a refund.
Meanwhile, I called Bank of America and told them what had happened and filed a dispute because I couldn’t contact Aeroflot… B of A granted me temporary funds.
Still no word from Aeroflot so I tried again. Moscow call center told me now to try LA offices. Had trouble contacting LA office but was finally able to talk to someone after the offices had closed. Still so many communication issues… It took me about two weeks to finally get word from the LA office that the NY office had sent in my refund.
Basically just a communication nightmare!
Still no word from the NY office… No confirmation email or anything of my refund.
If you’re having issues with Aeroflot, be patient. They aren’t a total scam, but it will take some serious determination just to get your own money back.

Aeroflot has really undergone a transformation in the last decade and is a great Russian carrier. I recently took a few flights — from JFK to Moscow (nonstop) and back as well as some flights between St. Petersburg and Moscow with Aeroflot.
The international flight is super comfortable. They even give you slippers! The plane is an Airbus 330 – 300. It’s a twin engine and cruises around 500mph or so – it’s huge. If you sit over the wing, the thing is massive! Not as large as the twin stories 380s, but it’s definitely a comfortable ride.
They feed you twice on the International flight. The food is nothing to write home about, but it’s pretty filling and I cleaned the plate every time they served something. They keep you hydrated pretty well and serve drinks regularly throughout the International flight. The entertainment system is pretty nice too. You have a choice of about 30 movies to watch and a variety of TV shows and you can choose English or Russian language.
On both flights, there seemed to be a problem with people sneaking a cigarette in the bathroom, which was promptly dealt with both times by the crew. Kind of funny, but come on guys… it’s 2015. You can’t smoke in a plane anymore. This is not the Mad Men era.
The domestic flights between St. Petersburg and Moscow were awesome as well. Aeroflot will actually serve you a sandwich (cheese, chicken and cucumber or some equivalent) on this short 1-​hour hop! We definitely don’t get that in the US anymore.
All in all, Aeroflot is a great comfortable and modern airline. Don’t be afraid to fly it. Their safety record in the last decade has been great.

flight was decent, passenger compartment was claustrophobically narrow; this caused lag time for stewardesses to serve passengers; looking for beer or liquor? Not here, that’s for sure! White wine only on first go around on a nine hour flight from JFK to Moscow, not impressive; also seat aisle numbers did not line up from window seats to middle aisle seating which cause great confusion to passengers; I won’t be flying Aeroflot again! They’d better get their act together because they’re hosting the Winter 2014 Olympics, which are already late in preparation and way over budget!

They have no idea what customer service really means. No respect what so ever. They are still live in Soviet era.

This was an excellent flight, it was incredible, my husband and I traveled from usa to italy with aeroflot and it was and incredible experience, great value for our money, I read reviews about this airline but non of them where real when I got to the plain, there was extra space for the legs, great entertainment for 9 hours, I could choose anything to watch, they gave us great food if you think about the fact that now almost all the other airlines charges for food. We had a lay over in Moscow for 4 hours I read online that was a horrible airport, not the case, this airport has free WiFi to entertain you and nice coffee places to relax.

Honestly, I would rate Aeroflot four stars, but I want to help pull up their 2 star average. This Unilocal page had me nervous, but Aeroflot was totally fine. My flight from JFK to Moscow was great, and the leg from Moscow to my destination in the Ukraine was fine too. It was less fancy than the cross-​Atlantic flight, and yes, plastic seats as another reviewer mentioned, but still comparable to a domestic flight by a major US carrier. Except they fed us!
The transatlantic flights were great. Cloth seats with adjustable headrest, free TV and movies, and the flight attendants were friendly and spoke English. It was clean, and not smelly like other reviewers mentioned.

Just flew Aeroflot from Moscow to Rome. Here are the highlights:
1) The seats and everything around me was plastic.
2) The plane started shaking. I figure, it’s turbulence. The purser’s voice comes on, in Russian, sounding very agitated. The plane continues to shake. The attendants who were serving drinks stop and rush back to the galley. I’m still waiting for a translation. The pilot comes on, speaking in English I can barely make out. All I hear is: no more coffee, extreme turbulence.
3) Dinner was served. I chose the fish. It was pasty. So I tried the bread. It was like cardboard. So I tried the cracker. It was like harder cardboard. So I ate the butter.
4) My luggage wasn’t on the plane. I was still in Moscow. Aeroflot would not deliver my luggage when it finally arrived two days later. I had to go back to the airport in Rome to pick up my luggage.
Oh, and this was Christmas Eve. Just lovely.

I fly overseas at least once a year (often more). I flew Aeroflot several times in the past 2 years. I have originally purchased a ticket because it was very cheap and I went somewhere on a whim. I was pleasantly surprised with my experience and started looking out for Aeroflot fares since then for my other flights. Maybe I just got lucky but in all my flying with Aeroflot my flights have never been delayed. The plane was very clean every time and the food was excellent. My mom who flew Aeroflot this month (December 2011) said she was not impressed with the attendants and that they kept forgetting her requests (again — maybe I got lucky each time but my attendants were always very kind and… ahem… attentive). I flew with them last while pregnant and I did not feel good. The attendant let me sit in her seat closer to the exit and kept giving me all the ginger ale and water and what not that I needed until I felt better and was ready to return to my seat. So if you had a bad experience with Aeroflot — I am terribly sorry — I believe it happens — just a reminder that not every flight is that bad. On a personal note, I have also enjoyed the fact that take offs and landings are much more tolerable in the newer nice Aeroflot planes. So far Aeroflot flights are the only flights were I did not get sick on landing and take off.
Big bummers: Since most Aeroflot flights connect in Moscow — you have to survive SVO to enjoy your experience. While SVO is a nice modern airport — the quality of service is not the greatest. People in the shops are not very friendly. Food options are scarce (even though they are working on it but in my section was only 1 overpriced restaurant (overpriced airport food is to be expected but Moscow is expensive the way it is and overpriced for Moscow goes way beyond that), 1 coffee shop, and a few newspaper stands with snacks and juices… and there’s always chocolate in duty free stores. The most annoying part was when some security comes in — they get everyone to get up and leave their waiting area and then re-​enter while having their hand luggage searched and passports checked. This is super annoying to wait in line, lose your seat, and haven’t I already been screened enough?
Side note: if you’re an American citizen traveling to Belarus — there’re 2 things you need to be aware of which may push you to chose another airline.
1) You will need a transit visa for Russia (regular transfer rules don’t apply because #2)
2) You will have to go through passport control, get your luggage, and go through customs in Moscow (Russia and Belarus have some sort of agreement) and re-​check-​in for your next leg to Minsk. I mean customs at SVO are not that bad but when I only have a few precious hours to transfer — it can get nerve-​wrecking.
You will not have that problem leaving Belarus though — your luggage will get checked through all the way to USA.

Let me preference this review by stating my expectation. I was bracing the worse.
I’ve made five trips to Russia — 1994, 1998 (during which I lived in Moscow for five months), 2000-​01, 2006 and 2011. Each trip was made on SAS or Delta Airlines. But when my friend announced last-​minute she was going to get married during peak summer time, costs were an issue. Fares were by far cheapest on Aeroflot, so I booked my boyfriend and me on the Russian airline.
The trip started out with a four-​hour delay from JFK to SVO. Aeroflot actually provided $ 15 vouchers/​per person for food and drink at JFK due to the delay. I’ve been delayed for nearly every reason possible and very rarely does an airline award money for food when a flight is delayed – whether the airline’s fault or not.
We boarded the flight and like another Unilocaler mention, there is a weird smell on board – similar to bad body odor mixed with food and something else that I couldn’t identify. The fluorescent orange chairs are bad not just because of the color but because they show all the stains. The pillows have a strange odor, too, which leads me to think they weren’t washed before our flight, and the blankets aren’t wrapped – which just confirms what I thought about the pillows.
Our flight was an Airbus with a two-​four-​two configuration in economy class. It’s great if you’re on the left or right side with just two seats across (which my boyfriend and I were) but crappy for those in the middle. Because of the configuration, you get a couple extra inches of room on the widow side. It also allows you to see all the crumbs and crud that has built up on the sides of the plane that the cleaning crews miss.
I ordered a special meal; my boyfriend went with the regular choice between two entrees. My low-​fat meal with no-​frills and the same for the dinner on the outbound and the lunch and dinner on the return – baked white fish and fruit. It wasn’t bad, and my boyfriend was satisfied with his. They did serve wine – but it’s out of a box. I took a sip and nearly spit out the wine because it was that bad.
The flight attendants weren’t rude to us, but then again, I’m an American who speaks Russian, so that could be a factor. My boyfriend said one of the flight attendants «looked miserable,» but she wasn’t mean.
The big perk – and again, this could be because of my expectations – is that we had individual entertainment sets in economy. This has been a big upgrade for Aeroflot’s fleet, especially for those aircraft flying international routes. Now, the video choices weren’t abundant (like Air France, which we usually fly), but there was enough to keep one busy for eight to 10 hours.
Another big upgrade is that Aeroflot flies into the newest terminal (Terminal III aka Sheremetyevo III). And it’s nice – I mean really nice. Every other time I’ve flown into Moscow, we’ve landed at Terminal II, and it’s a zoo – especially with passport control. With Terminal III, passport was a breeze and the airport is gorgeous with beautiful architecture, state-​of-​the-​art TV monitors, and every perk a big metropolitan airport should have. (JFK needs to take note.)
Aeroflot didn’t lose our luggage on the trans-​Atlantic flights, though there was a pretty large delay when waiting for our luggage to arrive on the belts in Moscow.
I’d give the airline a solid C+. Could it be better? Of course! Was it horrible? Not really.

Worst experience ever, whole company is full of sh…

Horrible! HORRIBLE!
Don’t EVER take this airline! In 2008 I had time and money for a vacation and was deciding between three places I always wanted to go: Russia, India, East Africa. The frugal part of me nagged and went with Russia, because it was the cheapest all-​in-​all to get to. So I tried to save some cash and went with Aeroflot. I think that was when I learned the hard way the tried-​and-​true cliché «you get what you pay for.»
I learned a trick: sometimes you can save hundreds in airfare by looking into two separate tickets. So, I bought a round-​trip Phoenix to New York, and a round-​trip New York to Moscow. I got to JFK a few hours early only to find out the flight was delayed. Actually, delayed is an understatement. I paid a luggage storage service to hold my bags, took the Sky Train and subway all the way into Manhattan, walked around downtown for a couple hours, had dinner, took the train back… then discovered my flight had been delayed AGAIN. So, come 4:30 AM I was finally on my merry little way to Moscow.
The seats were a hideous fluorescent orange and there was this «smell» on board. It was vaguely armpit mixed with beets and potatoes. I fell asleep before we even took off and woke up at meal service. I ordered a vegetarian meal and they served me chicken in a dish that looked like Chernobyl leftovers (yes, I know that was in Ukraine.) The girl across the aisle from me said she ordered a special meal and the dumpy, old, she-​hulk-​esque flight attendant screamed at her and slammed the food down on the girl’s tray. My experience with most foreign carriers is that booze is free. I asked if they had wine and the lovely flight attendant, walrusing her way down the aisle, flashed me that lovely Soviet disposition and bellowed in a voice reminding me of Natasha from «Rocky and Bullwinkle»… «You don’t get no wine! You want booze, you pay for first class.» Hmm… didn’t make much sense considering I could see others drinking something. I went back to sleep, then woke up with my cheek resting on the seat. I turned my head and my cheek peeled off whatever material it was lining those seats. I felt gross then. I woke up because someone decided to blast– no joke– Russian folk music on some antique-​looking wooden box. Needless to say, this was an awful start to my vacation.
If the mood ever strikes you to visit Russia… please, pay the extra money on another carrier, deal with the inconvenience of connecting somewhere… just don’t EVER fly with these somber Nachthexen.