Allegiant Will Put First Class in the 737 MAX 8-200 Ryanair Launched

Allegiant has put a first class on sale for the 737 MAX 8-200, the stretched MAX that Boeing launched with Ryanair. Here is what is planned, where the jet came from, and three Ryanair ones caught on my screen.

Allegiant Air plans to fly a two-class version of the Boeing 737 MAX 8-200 from 17 March 2027. AeroRoutes, in a schedule summary published on 6 October 2026, says Allegiant opened reservations in August 2026 for "Allegiant First", and that the two-class jet will seat 188, with 8 of those seats Allegiant First. The same page says the current single-class layout seats 190.

What changes

The arithmetic is simple: 188 seats with 8 of them up front leaves 180 behind the first-class cabin, against 190 in one class today. AeroRoutes gives the 17 March 2027 date as "based on schedule filing as of 04OCT26", and adds that "planned operational changes remain highly likely". It is a schedule filing, not an Allegiant announcement I have read, so the date and the seat counts are the airline's plan rather than a delivered product.

The jet comes from Ryanair

The 737 MAX 200 was launched with Ryanair. Boeing's release of 8 September 2014 announced a commitment from Ryanair for 100 aircraft, with options on another 100. Boeing described the variant as able to accommodate up to 200 seats, with a mid-exit door that raises the exit limit, and up to 5 per cent lower operating costs than the 737 MAX 8.

Ryanair was the launch customer. Wikimedia Commons titles its photographs of EI-IJY and EI-HAW as 737 MAX 8-200s, and titles Allegiant's N820NV the same way, so the jet Allegiant is adding a first class to is the same variant.

Ryanair's on my screen

The BBBRadar desk unit labels these as "Boeing 737 MAX 8", which is the type it shows rather than the -200 sub-type. Three Ryanair labels from 6 October 2026:

EI-IJY as RYR3BW, Dublin to Stansted, at 14,775 feet.
EI-IFR as RYR8AL, Luton to Vilnius, at 2,325 feet.
EI-HAW as RYR39LG, Malaga to East Midlands, at 21,075 feet.

Each label shows the route as filed, so those are the flights as they crossed the screen, not the aircraft's whole day.

What is not confirmed

Everything about Allegiant First here comes from one schedule summary. I have not read an Allegiant release, and I do not know which routes the two-class jets will fly first. The photograph of N820NV was taken in September 2025 and shows the aircraft in its current layout, not the new one.