The Airline Pilot Training Program, Phase By Phase
Five phases, one price, and an hour figure attached to each. This is the career route taught as a single sequence rather than sold as five separate purchases, and every phase names the regulation it is built against.
What Is An Airline Pilot Training Program?
A single enrolment covering every certificate and rating between an empty logbook and a flight instructor rating, taught as one continuous sequence rather than as five things bought separately. Here that means a private pilot certificate, an instrument rating, a commercial pilot certificate, a multi-engine class rating and a flight instructor certificate, for $89,000 fixed at enrolment.
The reason to buy it as one thing rather than five is not a discount. It is continuity. Phase boundaries are where flight training goes wrong: a student finishes a private certificate, takes six weeks to arrange the next payment, loses currency, and pays for it in the first four lessons of the instrument phase. A single sequence removes that gap by design.
The second reason is price certainty. A phase-by-phase route exposes you to whatever the published figures are on the day you reach each phase, which may be two years after you started. One number set on the day you sign removes that exposure, and that is a real transfer of risk from you to us.
What it does not include, and cannot, is the flight time between a commercial certificate and an airline transport pilot certificate. 61.129(a) puts a commercial certificate at 250 hours and 61.159(a) puts an unrestricted ATP at 1,500. Those 1,250 hours are earned in employment. The flight instructor rating at the end of phase five is precisely how most people earn them, which is why the program finishes where it does.
What Happens In Each Phase Of The Program?
Each phase names the paragraph that governs its aeronautical experience, the aircraft it is flown in, and what you hold at the end of it.
Phase One — Private Pilot Certificate
Flown in the single-engine trainers: Cessna 162 Skycatcher, Piper Warrior, Diamond DA20. 14 CFR 61.109(a) puts the aeronautical experience at 40 hours, 20 with an instructor and 10 alone, and inside the instructional hours are 3 at night containing a cross-country beyond 100 nautical miles and ten landings to a full stop. The program is built around 60 hours rather than 40, because 40 is a floor and AOPA publishes 50 to 70 hours as the national figure.
Phase Two — Instrument Rating
The rating that alters the manner of your flying rather than the machinery of it. 61.65(d) wants 50 hours of cross-country flown in command with 10 in an airplane, 40 hours in actual or simulated instrument conditions with 15 delivered by an instrument instructor, and one IFR cross-country covering 250 nautical miles with an approach at every airport on it and three distinct approach types across the flight. Redbird MCX time carries a real share of the procedural work here.
Phase Three — Commercial Pilot Certificate
61.123(a) sets eighteen as the minimum age and 61.123(h) requires the private certificate already held. 61.129(a) sets 250 hours: 100 in powered aircraft with half in airplanes, 100 in command, 20 hours of training, split as 10 instrument hours and 10 more in an airplane that is complex, turbine-powered or else technically advanced; and 10 hours flown alone or on the duties of a pilot in command. Retractable landing gear plus a constant-speed propeller are what make the Piper Arrow II count for that complex requirement.
Phase Four — Multi-Engine Class Rating
Flown in the Piper Seminole. 61.63(c)(3) removes the training-time minimum for an added class rating altogether; what remains is an instructor endorsement of competence under (c)(1) and a practical test under (c)(2), with no further knowledge test under (c)(4) where an airplane rating already sits on the certificate. Short in hours, dense in content: asymmetric flight is a genuinely different skill.
Phase Five — Flight Instructor Certificate
61.183 sets eligibility: eighteen years of age, a commercial or ATP certificate beneath, an instrument rating where the sought rating calls for one, a pass on the fundamentals of instructing knowledge test, and 15 hours commanding the category and class you intend to teach. This is the phase that turns the cash flow around, and the one that exposes every manoeuvre you had been getting away with rather than understanding.
Every Course On The Ladder, And What Each Costs
Course prices are packages rather than hourly rates: the airframe, its fuel, your instructor, the ground instruction and the simulator time all sit inside the figure. Van Nuys Airport, KVNY. Financing opens at $2,500 down. Read the financing routes →
The Assessment FlightSixty minutes flying it yourself, an instructor in the other seat, and a written read at the end on whether the plan in your head survives contact with an aircraft.
FROM$229
Book →
The only hourly figure published anywhere on this site is $179 wet, single-engine, for enrolled students, covering the airframe and its fuel rather than the person beside you. Neither the Piper Seminole nor the Cirrus SR22 Turbo carries an hourly figure at all. Examiner fees, knowledge test fees, the medical examination and your own equipment are settled directly with whoever provides them.
What Does The Career Program Cost, And What Is In It?
One figure for the sequence, and the individual phases beside it for comparison. Both routes end in the same certificates; they differ in when the price is fixed.
Airline Career Track
Phases one to five in a single enrolment, priced once and held at that number for the duration of your training.
- ✓Private, instrument, commercial, multi-engine, instructor
- ✓No repricing at any phase boundary
- ✓Continuous scheduling across phases
- ✓Financing opens at $2,500 down
Private Pilot — Comprehensive
Phase one alone, at 60 logged hours rather than the regulatory 40, with the simulator time built in.
- ✓60 hours logged
- ✓55 airborne, 5 in the Redbird MCX
- ✓50 hours flown dual
- ✓10 hours of ground instruction
Instrument Rating
Phase two alone, taught to the aeronautical experience 14 CFR 61.65(d) requires.
- ✓40 instrument hours, actual or simulated
- ✓15 hours from an instrument instructor
- ✓A 250 nautical mile IFR cross-country
Multi-Engine Add-On
Phase four alone, flown in the Piper Seminole, on whichever certificate you already hold.
- ✓No training-time floor, 61.63(c)(3)
- ✓Endorsement plus a practical test
- ✓Usually ten to fifteen hours
How Is The Program Structured Week To Week?
Around a tempo you commit to at enrolment rather than around a fixed calendar. Full time is three to four flights a week plus two ground sessions and roughly six hours of private study; part time is one to two flights with weekend ground work. Those are two different totals, not the same training stretched differently.
Part 61 is what makes that flexibility lawful. Training under part 61 is built against the aeronautical experience paragraphs directly rather than against an FAA-approved course outline, so a phase can be compressed when a student is genuinely ready and extended when they are not. The cost of that freedom is that part 61 does not offer the reduced minimums a part 141 school can, and this is a part 61 operation. The part 61 page sets out both sides of that trade.
The simulator does specific work rather than general work. A Redbird MCX session is excellent for procedures, instrument scan, emergency drills and anything that benefits from being paused and repeated. It is poor for landings, and pretending otherwise would cost you money. Five sessions sit inside the Comprehensive private pilot program and two inside Standard and Premium.
Weather is a smaller factor here than in most places and it is not zero. Across the twelve months to 1 August 2026, NOAA ASOS observations at Van Nuys admitted 355 days on which the ceiling stayed at 3,000 feet and visibility at five statute miles through four qualifying daylight hours. The honest counterpart is that actual instrument conditions are scarce in Los Angeles, so an instrument student here logs a great deal of simulated time and comparatively little in cloud.
Which Aircraft Do You Fly In Each Phase?
Six types, owned rather than brokered, and each phase uses the airframe that teaches its content most directly. The spread matters more than the count.
Phases One And Two — The Single-Engine Trainers
Three airframes carry the private pilot phase and most of the instrument phase: the Cessna 162 Skycatcher, the Piper Warrior, the Diamond DA20. They are simple aircraft on purpose. In the first forty hours the hard part is flying, not systems management, and an airframe that adds a second subject to the first one slows a student down while costing more per hour.
The panels differ deliberately across the fleet. Some of these aircraft carry traditional round instruments and some carry a glass display, and a pilot who has flown both is considerably harder to surprise than one who has only ever seen a single presentation of the same information.
- Cessna 162 Skycatcher
- Piper Warrior
- Diamond DA20
- Round-gauge and glass panels both on the field
Phase Three — The Complex Airplane
14 CFR 61.129(a)(3)(ii) requires 10 hours of training in an airplane that is complex, turbine-powered or technically advanced. The Piper Arrow II covers that requirement with retractable landing gear and a constant-speed propeller, which are the two systems that make an airplane complex in the regulatory sense.
There is a separate rule people trip over here. Before anyone may command a complex airplane at all, 61.31(e) wants a one-time endorsement in the logbook, and that is a separate thing from the training hours 61.129 asks for. Getting the endorsement is not the same as satisfying the experience requirement, and both are needed.
- Piper Arrow II — constant-speed propeller and gear that retracts
- 10 hours required by 61.129(a)(3)(ii)
- A separate one-time endorsement under 61.31(e)
Phase Four — The Twin, And The Premium Option
Multi-engine training happens on the Piper Seminole. A twin is a genuinely different aeroplane rather than a single with a spare engine, and the reason is what happens when one of the two stops. Asymmetric thrust, directional control and the decision-making around it are the substance of the phase, and they are why a rating with no regulatory hour minimum still takes ten to fifteen hours to do properly.
The Cirrus SR22 Turbo sits outside the phase structure as the aircraft of the Premium private pilot program. It is fast, it carries a glass panel and a parachute system covering the whole airframe, and it exists here for students who mean to begin on the equipment they intend to keep flying. Neither the Seminole nor the Cirrus carries an hourly figure on this site; both are reached through a program price.
- Piper Seminole — the multi-engine trainer
- Cirrus SR22 Turbo — the Premium program aircraft
- No hourly figure published for either
- Redbird MCX — full-motion, $189 a session
What Do You Hold At The End Of Each Phase?
Five rungs, with the paragraph that governs each and the price it carries when bought separately. The point of the sequence is that nothing between them is dead time.
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Phase 1
Private Pilot Certificate
$15,900Source: 14 CFR 61.109(a)Carrying passengers becomes lawful, though not for compensation, and 61.113 sets out precisely where that line is. Sold separately at $15,900 for the Comprehensive route. This is also the phase in which a medical problem would surface, which is the argument for sitting the examination in month one.
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Phase 2
Instrument Rating
$11,700Source: 14 CFR 61.65(d)Flying in cloud and on a clearance becomes lawful. A large share of the cross-country flying 61.65(d) demands also counts against the 250 hours in 61.129(a), which is exactly why this phase sits second rather than third.
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Phase 3
Commercial Pilot Certificate
Inside The RouteSource: 14 CFR 61.129(a)Being paid to fly becomes lawful. Not sold separately, because the price depends entirely on how much of the 250 hours in 61.129(a) is already in your logbook. Inside the sequence the hour count is known, so the number can be fixed honestly.
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Phase 4
Multi-Engine Class Rating
$5,100Source: 14 CFR 61.63(c)Twin-engine airplanes become lawful, and later the ability to instruct in one. Short because 61.63(c)(3) attaches no training-time minimum to an added class rating; ten to fifteen hours is the working figure and proficiency is the real test.
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Phase 5
Flight Instructor Certificate
Inside The RouteSource: 14 CFR 61.183Teaching for compensation becomes lawful, and the spending reverses. This is how most pilots close the gap between the 250 hours a commercial certificate needs and the 1,500 an unrestricted ATP needs.
The program stops here on purpose. Nothing sold on this site buys hours toward an airline transport pilot certificate, because those hours are earned in employment rather than purchased, and any school offering to sell them is selling something else. The hour-building page covers what that phase actually involves.
Who Should Buy The Whole Program Rather Than One Phase?
Someone who has already decided. The $89,000 route makes sense for a person who knows they want the career, can commit to a tempo, and values a number that will not move over the optionality of stopping between phases. It is a poor fit for anybody still deciding whether they enjoy flying, and we would rather say so before taking the money.
For anybody in that second group the sequence is short: fly the assessment flight, sit a first-class medical examination, and then buy phase one on its own at $15,900. If you finish the private certificate still wanting the career, the career track is still there. Nothing about starting with one phase closes the door to the whole route later.
The honest downside of the fixed-price route is that a naturally quick student subsidises a slower one a little. Fixing a price against a realistic hour count rather than the regulatory minimum is what makes it possible to hold the number, and that arithmetic works out slightly against the student who was always going to finish early. We would rather state that than pretend the fixed price is free.
The honest downside of the phase-by-phase route is exposure. Published prices are set on the day you read them, not the day you reach phase four, and a career route takes long enough for that to matter.
Why Is The Program Built This Way?
Six decisions behind the structure, each with the cost it carries. A design choice with no cost attached is usually a marketing claim.
One Enrolment Across Five Phases
Removes the gap at every phase boundary, which is where currency is lost and money is wasted. The cost is that it asks for a commitment before you have flown all five phases, which is why the assessment flight exists first.
A Price Fixed On The Day You Sign
Transfers price risk from the student to the school across a multi-year sequence. The cost is that the figure has to be set against a realistic hour count rather than the regulatory floor, so a fast student pays slightly more than they strictly needed to.
Simple Airframes Early, Complex Ones Late
The first forty hours teach flying; adding systems management to that makes both harder. The cost is that a student who wants a glass panel from lesson one has to choose the Premium program instead, at $22,500.
Ground Instruction Inside The Price
Ten hours of it in the Comprehensive program, so knowledge testing is not left to self-study and last-minute cramming. The cost is that the program price looks higher than an airframe-only quotation from somewhere that does not include it.
Tempo Agreed Before Enrolment
Because tempo governs both duration and total cost more than any other variable. The cost is an uncomfortable conversation early, in which we may tell you that one flight a week will make this take much longer than you want.
The Program Ends At The Instructor Rating
Because the next 1,250 hours are employment rather than training and cannot be sold honestly. The cost is that the program does not, on its own, get you to an airline transport pilot certificate, and we say that in the price note rather than in a footnote.
What Can You Verify About This Program Before Enrolling?
Five things, each of which a stranger could confirm without taking our word for anything. There is no sixth item about outcomes, because we do not have one worth publishing.
Airframe Types Used Across The Five Phases
Cessna 162 Skycatcher, Piper Warrior, Piper Arrow II, Diamond DA20, Cirrus SR22 Turbo, Piper Seminole — every one of them on our own books. Every phase of the program is flown on aircraft that belong to the operation teaching it.
Inspected under 14 CFR 91.409(b)Instructors Available Across The Program
Each holding a commercial certificate or an ATP, an instructor certificate above it and a medical in date. Enough of them that a five-phase sequence does not stall on one person's calendar, and you may change instructor without changing school.
14 CFR 61.183 · 61.23 · 61.195Days A Year The Weather Allowed Training
Counted from NOAA ASOS observations for the twelve months ending 1 August 2026, admitting a day only where the ceiling held at 3,000 feet and visibility at five statute miles through four qualifying daylight hours. The threshold is published with the figure.
NOAA ASOS via the Iowa Environmental MesonetA Standalone Redbird MCX Session
It moves, it is fully enclosed, it is FAA-approved, and weather never takes a session away. Five sessions sit inside the Comprehensive private pilot program and two inside Standard and Premium. Strong for procedures, weak for landings, and we publish both halves.
Published rather than quoted on requestPhases Repriced After Enrolment
None. The figure agreed on the day you sign covers the sequence as written. Where a student needs additional hours beyond the program, that is discussed in advance and in writing rather than appearing on an invoice.
Set out in the training agreementWhat Happens After The Fifth Phase?
You start being paid to fly, and the arithmetic reverses. A flight instructor certificate is what lets you log flight time as employment rather than as expenditure, and closing the distance between the 250 hours behind a commercial certificate and the 1,500 behind an unrestricted airline transport pilot certificate is what the next one to two years are for.
It is worth understanding what that period is actually like before you sign up for the route that leads to it. The hours arrive in the shape of a school's demand rather than yours, which means early starts, weekends and a great deal of traffic-pattern work. A wet fortnight or an aircraft in maintenance can flatten a month. We publish no income figure for instructing because we could not source one that is both current and defensible.
There are other routes through the same gap. Banner towing, pipeline patrol, aerial survey, traffic watch and glider or parachute operations all build time. All of them are jobs. None of them can be bought as a package from a flight school, and a provider offering to sell you 1,250 hours is describing something other than training.
The composition matters as much as the total. 61.159(a) wants 500 cross-country hours, 100 at night, 50 in class, 75 instrument and 250 in command. A pilot who instructs entirely in a local traffic pattern can reach 1,500 total hours and still be short on cross-country and night, so it is worth watching those two columns from the first month of instructing rather than the last.
How Does The Fixed Price Compare To Buying Phases?
The same five phases, two ways of paying for them. The difference is not the certificates at the end; it is who carries the price risk in between.
One Enrolment Against Five Purchases
| What Differs | Career Track | Phase By Phase |
|---|---|---|
| Price | $89,000, all five phases | Set at each phase, on the day you reach it |
| When The Figure Is Fixed | The day you sign | Never fully |
| Phase One | Included | $15,900 Comprehensive |
| Phase Two | Included | $11,700 instrument rating |
| Phase Three | Included | Not sold separately |
| Phase Four | Included | $5,100 multi-engine add-on |
| Phase Five | Included | Not sold separately |
| Gap Between Phases | Scheduled continuously | However long the next payment takes |
| Who Carries Price Risk | The school | You |
| Suits | A decision already made | A decision still being made |
Questions About The Training Program
All five phases: a private pilot certificate, an instrument rating, a commercial pilot certificate, a multi-engine class rating and a flight instructor certificate. Aircraft, fuel, instruction, ground school and simulator time sit inside the figure. Examiner fees, knowledge test fees, your medical examination and your own equipment are settled directly with whoever provides them, and none of them is priced on this site.
Typically twelve to eighteen months flying full time, meaning three to four flights a week plus ground work. Part time it stretches to two or three years, because currency decays between lessons and part of each flight goes on recovering ground already covered. Tempo is the largest variable you control, and it is agreed at enrolment rather than assumed.
No, and no honest program does. 14 CFR 61.129(a) puts a commercial certificate at 250 hours and 61.159(a) sets 1,500 hours behind the unrestricted version of an airline transport pilot certificate. The 1,250 in between are flight time earned in employment, most commonly as a flight instructor, which is why phase five ends with that certificate rather than the program continuing.
Yes. Financing opens at $2,500 down, with monthly plans arranged either through Stratus Financial or in house. The published $89,000 is the program price rather than a cash-only figure. What financing costs you in total depends on the term and the rate you are offered, and those are set by the lender rather than by us.
No. Airline Pilot Flight School trains under part 61. That means your syllabus is built directly against the aeronautical experience paragraphs rather than against an FAA-approved course outline, so a phase can be compressed or extended to fit the student. The trade is real: part 61 does not offer the reduced hour minimums a part 141 school can, and we would rather state that than skate past it.
Yes. Phase one assumes an empty logbook. What we ask you to do first is fly an assessment flight and sit a medical examination, in either order, inside the same fortnight. Between them they cost a fraction of one per cent of the program and they are the two things capable of ending the plan, so finding out early is worth a great deal.
It is discussed in advance and in writing rather than appearing on an invoice. The program is built around a realistic hour count rather than the regulatory floor precisely so that this is uncommon, but students differ and pretending otherwise would be dishonest. The training agreement sets out how additional hours are handled, and you receive it before payment.
Phases one and two use the single-engine trainers: Diamond DA20, Piper Warrior, Cessna 162 Skycatcher. Phase three uses the Piper Arrow II for the complex-airplane requirement in 14 CFR 61.129(a)(3)(ii). Phase four is flown in the Piper Seminole. The Cirrus SR22 Turbo sits outside the sequence as the Premium private pilot aircraft.
Yes, and any certificate you have already earned is permanently yours. What happens to money not yet flown against is governed by the training agreement, which is handed over before payment rather than afterwards. Read the refund terms in that document and ask about anything that is not clear before signing, at this school or any other.
We cannot say that, and neither can anybody else honestly. This is a part 61 training provider with no cadet program, no pathway agreement and no relationship with any carrier. Hiring is decided by employers on criteria they set and change. What the program delivers is five certificates and ratings, taught to the standards, at a published price.
What The Program Is, And What It Is Not
Airline Pilot Flight School is a flight training provider based at Van Nuys Airport, working under part 61 of 14 CFR. The word “airline” in the name describes the destination our students are training toward and nothing else.
This business is not an airline and is not owned by one. There is no cadet program here, no pathway agreement, no conditional offer and no hiring relationship with any carrier. Nothing in the program guarantees an interview, employment or a salary, and a training provider implying otherwise is describing an outcome outside its control.
No pass rate and no graduate count appears on this site. The operation is new and has no record worth publishing on either measure; inventing one, or borrowing somebody else's, would be worse than the silence. What is published instead is the syllabus, the hours, the aircraft, the price and the federal paragraph behind each requirement.
The program ends at a flight instructor certificate. It does not deliver an airline transport pilot certificate, because the flight time behind one is earned in employment against 14 CFR 61.159 or else 61.160, and no training provider can sell that.
Walk The Line Before You Sign Anything
$89,000 is a large commitment and it deserves an afternoon of scepticism before it deserves a signature.
Come and see the actual aircraft each phase is flown in. Ask what the airframe hours are, ask who signs the maintenance, ask how many students each instructor is carrying this month, and ask what happens to your slot when a lesson is cancelled for weather.
Ask for the two documents that matter as well: the syllabus for the five-phase sequence, and the training agreement with its refund terms. Both exist, both are handed over before payment rather than after, and any school unwilling to do that is telling you something.
The Phase Aircraft
The single-engine trainers for phases one and two, the Piper Arrow II for the complex requirement in phase three, and the Piper Seminole for phase four. Sit in all of them and ask why each one is where it is in the sequence.
The Redbird MCX
Enclosed and full-motion. Ten minutes inside will show you what procedural training in a simulator is genuinely good for, and where it stops being a substitute for an aircraft.
The Instructors
Eleven, each meeting 14 CFR 61.183. Ask who would carry you through phase one and whether the same person would carry you into phase two, and what happens if the match is wrong.
The Agreement
The syllabus and the training agreement, in your hands before money moves. Read what happens if you stop at phase two, and read what happens if you need hours beyond the program.
Fly One Hour Before You Commit To Five Phases
An hour tells you what no page can: whether you like the work, whether you take correction well, and whether you hold up in an aircraft that is moving. You do the flying, an instructor sits beside you, and it ends in a written read on what the five phases would really ask of your calendar and your money. Enroll inside a day and the whole $229 is credited to the program.
Read The Detail Behind Each Phase
The Career Route
How To Become An Airline PilotAirline Pilot RequirementsHow Long It Takes To Become An Airline PilotPilot Certificates In OrderPhase By Phase
Instrument RatingCommercial Pilot LicenseMulti-Engine RatingCertified Flight InstructorCost And Payment
What Airline Pilot Training CostsEvery Program Price On One PageFlight Training FinancingFixed Price Flight TrainingHours And Rules
Airline Pilot Flight Hour RequirementsBuilding Flight HoursThe 1,500 Hour RulePart 61 Training StructureThe School And The Field
Our FleetFull Motion Simulator TrainingFlying Days And Training TempoHow To EnrollFly The Aeroplane Once, Then Decide
The assessment flight is the first hour of the syllabus and a two-way evaluation. You fly it from the left seat with an instructor beside you, they write down what they saw, and you get an honest read on whether the plan is realistic. It is loggable, and it is credited in full against enrolment if you enroll within 24 hours.
What happens on an assessment flight →