I take a look at the FAA U.S. Civil Airmen Statistics each year. It’s good to see data beyond anecdotal evidence.
Table 22 shows 13,000+ more student pilot certificates were issued in 2023 compared to 2022. That’s a 24% increase.
- 69,503 – 2023
- 56,170 – 2022
- 50,784 – 2021
- 49,933 – 2020
- 48,476 – 2019
- 45,354 – 2018
- 38,401 – 2017
- 36,145 – 2016
- 47,381 – 2015
- 47,407 – 2014
Table 13 reports the average ages of active pilots by category. Compared to 2013, some categories are up, some are down.
- 35.2 – Student (up from 31.5)
- 61.1 – Sport (up from 55.2)
- 46.5 – Private (down from 48.5)
- 33.6 – Commercial (down from 45.4)
- 50.4 – ATP (up from 49.7)
Table 12 shows the estimated active pilot certificates held by category and age group. In total, 806,939 pilot certificates are held.
Below are the largest segments by age in each category:
- 55,336 – Student (25-29)
- 1,113 – Sport (65-69)
- 22,074 – Private (20-24)
- 19,045 – Commercial (25-29)
- 24,784 – ATP (55-59)
Designated Pilot Examiner Jason Blair dove into the 2023 FAA data and wrote about his finding in a series of posts on his website: https://jasonblair.net/
His insights are worth reading, if you care at all about the future of aviation.
One of Jason’s charts plots Private and Commercial Pilot Certificates and Instrument Ratings issued since 2010. As you can see in his chart below, these are trending in the right direction — up.
And if you’d like to see some specific examples of what is happening within the numbers, take a look at the Spring 2024 edition of AviNation.
Stories include:
- High school soaring team, page 8
- Ava Shelly soloed a Cirrus SR20, a Robinson R-44, and earned her private pilot certificate in a glider, all on her 16th birthday
- Kevin Lacey’s Tango Thirty-One Aero Clube is creating young aviators one at a time. (We written about Kevin multiple times in General Aviation News.)
The 56-page magazine has plenty more stories, but I’m sure you get the idea.
If you know someone in their teens, share the link to AviNation’s digital edition. Who knows? Maybe they’ll be inspired.
Sure, we’ve got challenges in this industry. But there are also some good things happening.
And that continues to give me hope.
If I had anything to say about the training of foreign students I would say a big NO! Some of those might be dropping bombs on people in the future??? Let them train their own people!!
Another goofy political dig by Kent. He can’t resist turning these aviation forums into political garbage. Sad.
How many of these new student pilot licenses are for foreign students? Even with the rapidly increasing costs of training, the US is still by far the cheapest place to learn to fly in the world. That’s why so many foreign students come here.
I have observed an noticeable decrease in the knowledge and skill level of new CFI’s, compared to 10 to 15 years ago.
While at first glance this seems encouraging. But it is hard to believe, given the explosion in the costs of everything thanks to Bidenomics. I wonder how many of the new certificates were on borrowed money? And how many of these new pilots will be active pilots five years from now. Unless the cost of instruction, fuel, maintenance, new and used aircraft, hangar rent, and government fees comes down, and dramatically, I do not see much grounds for optimism for general aviation, especially sport aviation, people who fly simply for the pleasure of it.
So what is Agent Orange going to do for GA? Looks like Biden’s run has more pilots coming in and Trump had a lull. You can politicize this all you want but at the same time it’s not the president, it’s the industry.