United Airlines has some big and exciting upgrades coming to the inflight entertainment experience.

The Chicago-based carrier is adding more screens, introducing new entertainment features, innovating with faster internet connectivity and so much more.

While the airline has a long list of updates coming to its inflight entertainment experience, United just “hasn’t made a lot of noise about it recently,” Dominic Green, United’s director of inflight entertainment, told TPG during an exclusive interview. (Perhaps Green was referring to Delta Air Lines’ splashy keynote during the Consumer Electronics Show at the Sphere in Las Vegas earlier this month, where the airline debuted some largely iterative upgrades to the inflight entertainment experience.)

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For Green’s team, the focus has been to test, iterate and improve, without commanding headlines.

That said, there’s lots to get excited about, especially for aviation enthusiasts. Here’s everything you need to know about United’s inflight entertainment upgrades.

600 aircraft and counting

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It starts with the availability of inflight screens; more and more United aircraft now feature personal TVs than ever before.

In 2021, the airline unveiled its United Next brand strategy that includes a new signature interior across its mainline fleet. Part of that updated look is the addition of entertainment screens equipped with Bluetooth connectivity.

Green said that the airline recently introduced its 600th aircraft equipped with seatback screens, and “we’ll probably hit a thousand aircraft over the next couple of years that have seatback screens at every seat,” he added.

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In addition to the screens themselves, over 300 aircraft feature Bluetooth connectivity at every seat, making it possible to pair wireless headphones, including AirPods, with the entertainment systems. This makes United the undisputed U.S. leader when it comes to Bluetooth functionality, as Delta just announced at CES that it would bring this tech to more planes in the coming years. (Right now, only first-class seats on Delta’s Airbus A321neo feature Bluetooth.)

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Furthermore, United’s new screens are all 4K resolution, Green said, making them some of the highest definition in the U.S. airline industry. (Delta also announced this month that 4K screens would debut in the coming years but stopped short of sharing a rollout schedule.)

All told, United’s seatback technology is already some of the best in the business, and it will only get better in the years to come.

Introducing Control Tower view

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I’m a frequent United flyer, so imagine my surprise last week when I stumbled upon a new inflight map feature: Control Tower view.

This view allows you to pull up a map of the airfield that’s overlaid with all the aircraft around you. Clicking on each little plane brings up its call sign and operating airline. Going forward, the pilot won’t need to tell you that you’re No. 25 for departure — you’ll be able to see that clearly on your inflight monitor.

Control Tower view is a new feature that United is testing, Green said. It’s enabled in partnership with the FlightPath3D product that United licenses from a company called Betria Interactive.

“We thought it’d be really cool that customers could see where they are on the airfield. We already have pretty good quality zoom-level maps, like down to kind of street-level view, and we said, well, it’d be great to have that airfield terminal level where you could actually see where you’re at. Cool for aviation geeks, watching the little planes move around, but also I think it’s really helpful for customers,” Green added.

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The Control Tower view is powered by the flight deck’s navigation systems and a live feed of planes from FlightAware.

Green expects this feature to be a hit with flyers, especially since the moving map is the most watched piece of content on United planes, he told TPG. There’s no timeline on when Control Tower view might expand to other planes, but if you’re flying United soon, take a look at the moving map and see if you have the option to enable it.

Channel 9 is here to stay

Back when music was the only type of entertainment United offered, the airline had an innovation for aviation enthusiasts. It would allow flyers to listen to the air traffic control radio chatter between the pilots and the controllers.

This was always available on Channel 9, and when United started adding on-demand entertainment, it kept the Channel 9 feed around. (You’ll find it under the “Audio” tab on the screens.)

That said, in recent years, United’s aviation enthusiast customers have complained that Channel 9 hasn’t been working. According to Green, the functionality is still very much available — it’s just that more and more pilots are choosing not to enable the feed.

“Pilots can turn it off if they don’t want people to hear whatever chatter is going on,” Green explained. All hope isn’t lost, though. “We know it’s a cool feature,” Green added. “We have it enabled as much as we can.”

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Software updates keep things fresh

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Just like your iPhone gets a new major software update each year, United is planning a regular cycle of software updates to keep the seatback entertainment screens bug-free and up to date.

“We launched new UX [user experience] just over a year ago … and we’ve already done three software updates since we launched that a year ago,” Green said.

United rarely announces these smaller software updates, but be on the lookout for new features and updates in the coming months. You never know what you might find, Green teased.

Starlink impacts inflight entertainment

United announced last year that it would bring Elon Musk’s Starlink satellite internet service to its entire fleet. This is a multiyear journey that’s just getting started — the first plane to get Starlink will be flying in the spring — but Green’s team is already studying what the new faster Wi-Fi can do for the seatback screen experience.

Green wasn’t ready to share the details just yet, but he did allude to the fact that travelers will see more timely updates and live content on the entertainment screens.

Of course, travelers will still be able to use their own devices to consume content, but United wants to tap into the faster, more reliable internet to offer a living room-like experience in the seatback entertainment systems.

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Extended displays aren’t coming soon

As more travelers bring their own tablets and laptops on board, I’ve always wondered why airlines don’t offer a screencasting feature on the entertainment screens. After all, it’s a lot easier to get work done with some additional screen real estate.

Turns out, United can already technically enable screencasting today, Green said, but a major issue will likely mean that flyers will never see this functionality.

“We’ve had a lot of pushback from our corporate partners that say they don’t necessarily want their staff using publicly available screens,” Green said.

It’s not that United would have access to any data; it’s that they don’t want nosy passengers snooping in on their neighbors.

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