“To offer a better service”
We’re not yet a week into 2026, and we have our first negative story about BA: they will be ending hot breakfast service on some short-haul routes. Given that it was trialled on some flights last year, this adjustment should come as no surprise, although the hope was that the trial went badly.
What has been announced?
Nothing officially. There’s no press release about this “positive” change. Instead, it’s been announced internally and leaked.
Breakfast on flights to AMS, BHD, BRU, CDG, DUB, JER, MAN & NCL will switch to a fresh fruit plate, yoghurt and a heated pastry, making it easier to deliver and giving you more time in the cabin with our customers. Other Domestic and European Band 1 flights will continue to receive a full hot breakfast.
So that means if you’re flying to/from any of these cities and LHR around breakfast time, the only thing that will be warm is the heated pastry. No traditional hot breakfast, or sadly, no bacon roll.
- Amsterdam
- Belfast
- Brussels
- Parid CDG
- Dublin
- Jersey
- Manchester
- Newcastle
Service on other flights and in long-haul is unaffected.
Why change the breakfast at all?
Yes, the MAN and Jersey flights are short, so the cabin crew have to work harder on that service. The Club Europe cabin can be ten rows, so forty passengers in total need food and drink in what is really thirty minutes.
However, having flown Manchester to Heathrow many times (and they do already have a more cut-down version of the breakfast on these two routes), the crew manage to get through it.
Like a lot of changes, this isn’t really about giving staff time to serve people. It’s cost-cutting. Saving £2 per passenger, multiplied by fifteen or twenty breakfast-time flights a day, and that does start to represent a reasonable saving.
If you’re flying to Edinburgh or Glasgow, your hot breakfast will still be served.
What’s the real impact on passengers?
This is where it gets interesting.
When we have flown into BA in the morning, it’s always to connect onto another BA flight. I play a game called “how many breakfasts can I consume”, which I like to think my wife finds impressive. That starts in the lounge at MAN, followed by another round of food on the plane, a lounge in T5A, then a final breakfast in the excellent BA lounge in T5B. It’s a fun game, but swapping my in-flight bacon roll for a warm croissant won’t really impact me.
For those who don’t play my game of greed, my point is that you have plenty of breakfast options. This will have zero impact on travellers who are connecting in Heathrow.
For those flying into LHR and then leaving the airport, there will still be a breakfast on the flight (just a little less hearty) and an opportunity to eat in the lounge beforehand.
What it really represents is another unwanted downsizing of the BA experience, and no matter how you paint the picture, it’s been a downward slide over the last few years.
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