Air Tahiti Nui

Air Tahiti Nui is French Polynesia's flag carrier, and its whole existence is built around one very long, very thin route: Papeete to Los Angeles and on to Paris, roughly the longest way most travellers will ever fly to reach a beach. It is a boutique operation, a single aircraft type flying a handful of destinations, and it leans into the South Pacific identity rather than trying to compete on network breadth. If you are going to Tahiti, you are probably going on this airline.

The fleet is Boeing 787-9 Dreamliners, and every one is fitted the same three-cabin way. Poerava is the lie-flat business cabin at the nose. Moana is a dedicated premium economy behind it, a real middle tier with its own wider seat rather than a blocked-off economy row. Then comes the main economy cabin. The Dreamliner suits these ultra-long sectors well: lower cabin altitude, larger dimming windows and a quieter ride than the older widebodies it replaced, which matters when a single leg can run more than eight hours in the air.

The three cabins give three quite different flights. Poerava business lies flat and is the seat to book if you can sleep across the Pacific overnight. Moana premium economy is the value play on these distances: more width, more recline and more legroom than economy, at a fraction of the business fare, which earns its keep on a route this long. Economy is a standard Dreamliner layout, best towards the front where the cabin is calmer and away from the galleys. On a flight measured in the number of films you can watch, the step up between cabins is felt hour by hour.

On the LA and Paris runs, premium economy is the smart middle if a lie-flat is out of reach: the extra recline and legroom change how you arrive after a night in the air. In economy, choose a forward seat for a calmer cabin and a faster exit, and the rows ahead of the wing for the steadiest ride; avoid the back few rows by the rear galleys, where the aisle stays busy on an overnight. Window seats on the 787 get the dimming windows, so you control the light through the long daylight stretch over the ocean rather than fighting a shade.