As part of our trip to Iceland, we flew Cathay Pacific’s A330-300 Business Class on CX652 from Singapore to Hong Kong. This was an award flight booked via Cathay Pacific.

Before the flight

We checked out the Cathay Pacific lounge in T4. It had the usual noodle bar, great for a quick pre-flight bite and a taste of Hong Kong. You can also access other oneworld lounges at Changi, but we skipped them this time since our flight was around noon and time was tight.

Boarding at the gate was chaotic, with a huge crowd and a very long priority boarding queue. It seems like our flight had quite a number of frequent flyers. The departure was delayed as well.

The seats

Cathay Pacific uses some regional A330s fitted with recliner seats for flights between Singapore and Hong Kong, so it’s a bit of luck whether you get these or the newer Cirrus seats. We’ve had last-minute aircraft swaps before (to these regional recliner seats), but this time the regional 2-2-2 seats were confirmed months out.

This particular A330-300 aircraft is marked as the 33P with 24 business class seats.

The recliner seats had a refresh recently with new seat covers, but it’s still the same old seat though it was green previously. A blanket and pillow were provided for the short flight, together with a label-free Evian water bottle.

If you’re used to Cathay’s long-haul business cabins or have seen the new Aria suites, this setup is a major downgrade since you can also get “better” seats on the same route. The seats are okay-ish, but they don’t go fully flat and feel more premium economy than business. It didn’t help that there was some leftover breakfast cereal near my seat.

In-flight entertainment and Wi-Fi

The in-flight entertainment screen is showing its age and barely responded to touch, which got annoying after a while. Not really the best experience considering there are usually newer aircraft with modern IFE setups that fly this route. You can check the current movie lineup on Cathay’s entertainment site before your flight.

Since August 2025, Cathay offers free in-flight Wi-Fi for business class and above, which we used without issues. It’s good to see more airlines offering free Wi-Fi, especially as competitors like Singapore Airlines have had this for a while.

Food and drinks

Before departure, we were offered a pre-departure drink and we chose the Cathay Delight, which is a kiwi and coconut-based mocktail, which was great.

Printed menus were also placed at our seats, and we were offered to choose our main course, which we chose the stir-fried prawns with XO sauce, and a choice of drink. I personally got the Hong Kong-style milk tea, which, to my understanding, is actually made from powder on-board. You can ask for a glass of ice if you prefer it cold.

For starters, smoked salmon was served.

Followed by the main course of stir-fried prawn with XO sauce and rice.

After the main course were done, we were offered fruits, cheese or ice cream. You can always request for more if you’d like.

The cabin crew were excellent, and very professional, courteous, and attentive throughout the flight.

Final thoughts

For this route, you’d want to try avoiding the regional A330 with recliner seats if you’re redeeming miles for a short-haul flight. It’s okay for a daytime hop if the price or miles value is right, like connecting onward to China for 28,000 Asia Miles. If you can snag a 1-2-1 seat with newer cabins, that’s always a better option, considering how Singapore Airlines already have full lie-flat beds for all their aircrafts, including for regional routes.