The dreaded middle seat. 

Unless it’s an absolute necessity, the middle seat is everyone’s least favorite seat.

But what if you could avoid being seated in the middle seat?

Well, thanks to United Airlines, that is now a possibility. 

United Airlines recently rolled out a new feature in their mobile app that allows travelers to choose their preferred seating location during their reservation. Travelers can pick from options like aisle, window, exit or seats in the bulkhead rows. The app will then automatically move a passenger to their seat preference if a better seat becomes available.

The best part is that this is all done without any additional costs or fees. The only stipulations are that the seat must be in the same class of service and seat changes will only happen up to 12 hours before the flight takes off.

How Did This Affect Passengers?

According to United Airlines, in just one month, over 18,000 passengers were able to avoid being seated in the middle seat thanks to this new feature in their app.

United also noted that 40% of their app users who utilized this new feature were able to get their first choice of preferred seats, which allowed them to have an enhanced travel experience. 

For frequent flyers and seasoned travelers, this new feature is quite valuable, as it allows them to bypass sites like aeroLOPA, which helps people find the best seats on an airplane, and just set their preferred seating preferences right in United’s app.

United added this new feature to their app as part of their ongoing efforts to improve their customers’ experience. Their hope is that the three million daily users of their app will now have a smoother and more enjoyable travel process thanks to the flexibility and convenience of this new seating feature.