Jetstar vs Qantas: Who offers the best value long haul?

Sharon Petersen

By Sharon Petersen Wed Apr 5, 2023

In this week’s long-haul, low-cost vs full-service airline comparison, we take a look at Jetstar vs Qantas on a flight from Sydney to Honolulu. Looking at cost, comfort, aircraft and flight time we will see who offers the best value.

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Our Jetstar vs Qantas fly-off to Honolulu will be taking place on August 28 to September 11th, 2023. Both Jetstar and Qantas operate direct flights on this route with a 787 and A330 respectively.

Our return flight with Jetstar came to $1192 AUD with the inclusion of a meal, snack and four bottles of water on each segment, a standard window seat, access to the in-flight entertainment, 20kg of checked baggage and a 7kg carry-on bag.  Amenity kits such as blankets and pillows are also available for $25 but given most passengers wouldn’t buy these, we left that off the price for this exercise.

Our flight with Qantas came in at $1494 which included meals, snacks, unlimited drinks, in-flight entertainment, amenities, 23kg of baggage and a 7kg carry-on bag.

In terms of comfort, the leg room is only one inch (or 2.5 cm) more on Qantas than Jetstar however the seat recline is roughly double.  The actual seat width is virtually the same.

The Qantas A330 offers a comfortable 2-4-2 seating configuration across the plane where as the 787 is fitted out as 3-3-3.

Despite the layout of the A330 being one of my favourites, with a $302 AUD difference in the fare and a comparable level of comfort and flight time, in this example the author would opt to save that $302 for the destination and take Jetstar.

If you missed last week's long-haul comparison between AirAsiaX and Malaysia Airlines check it out here

Are you enjoying our reviews so far? Are there any routes would you like us to evaluate? Place a comment below or get in touch via our social pages

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