In the spring of 2026, United Airlines commenced the delivery of its newest fleet of Boeing 787-9s, showcasing a completely revamped onboard experience. These aircraft feature an ultra-premium configuration with merely 222 seats, which includes an impressive 64 business class seats, along with new offerings throughout the cabins.
A notable advancement on this aircraft is the inclusion of privacy doors for the business class seats, a feature that many passengers appreciate. However, until now, the doors had remained locked and inaccessible. Fortunately, this is beginning to change as they are gradually being unlocked.
United receives certification for 787 business class suite doors
Aircraft seat certification has become quite a hassle for airlines today, often leading to significant delays for new planes. In the case of United’s new 787-9 business class seats, they were certified relatively quickly… for the most part. This isn’t surprising, given that the airline is utilizing the Elevate Ascent product, specifically designed for the Dreamliner, which is already utilized by other carriers.
The challenge is that although the seats have privacy doors, they had been locked and unavailable for passenger use until recently. This situation has started to change. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has reportedly approved the doors for use on United’s 787s, which means that they can now be opened and closed.
A Reddit user posted a photo of the doors finally in operation, indicating that the flight was on the newly received 787-9 with the registration N71108, which entered commercial service on July 30, 2026.
Ultimately, business class seat doors aren’t necessarily a groundbreaking feature; however, if the planes are equipped with them, it’s certainly advantageous to have the option to utilize them.
It will take a while for all suite doors to be unlocked
Once the business class suite doors receive certification, one might assume that they would all be unlocked within hours and that the process would be straightforward. Unfortunately, that is not the reality, and it may take weeks for the suite doors on all eight of United’s current Dreamliners with updated cabins to be unlocked.
Newly delivered 787s arriving from the factory should have the suite doors unlocked, so this issue is expected to be minimal moving forward.
The lengthy timeline for unlocking suite doors is reminiscent of a similar scenario at American Airlines. The carrier has its new A321XLRs, which feature business class suites with doors. While these aircraft have been in operation for several months, the suite doors only received certification recently. The airline is currently in the process of unlocking these doors but expects that it will take “through the fall” to finalize the project.
Bottom line
The FAA has now approved United’s new Boeing 787-9 Polaris business class suite doors for use. Until now, these doors had been locked due to a lack of certification, but that situation has finally been resolved.
However, do not anticipate their immediate availability across the fleet. While at least one aircraft now has the doors unlocked, it will take additional time for the doors on other planes to be activated.