Commercial Pilot License Requirements, Rule By Rule
Every requirement on this page is quoted from the paragraph that creates it, with the sub-paragraph number beside it, so you can check the claim rather than take our word for it.
Which Requirements Does A Commercial Pilot License Carry?
Nine of them, and they all sit in 14 CFR 61.123. Be at least eighteen years of age. Read English, write it, speak it and understand it. Receive a logbook endorsement from an authorized instructor who conducted the ground training, or reviewed your home study, on the knowledge areas in 61.125, and who certifies you are prepared for the knowledge test. Pass that knowledge test. Receive training and an endorsement on the areas of operation in 61.127(b). Meet the aeronautical experience requirements for the category and class you want before applying for the practical test. Pass the practical test. Hold at least a private pilot certificate issued under part 61, or meet 61.73. Comply with the rest of the part that applies to your category and class.
Eight of those nine are administrative. The ninth — the aeronautical experience — is the one that takes two years, and for an airplane single-engine rating it lives in 61.129(a): a 250-hour total logged as a pilot, arranged in a specific way.
One requirement is not in 61.123 at all and is missed constantly. 61.23(a)(2) asks for at least a second-class medical certificate while you exercise commercial privileges. You can complete every line of 61.129 and still be unable to use the certificate, and that is a bad month to have a surprise in.
What Does The Logbook Have To Show?
Four totals and five specific flights. The totals come from 61.129(a)(1) and (a)(2): a 250-hour total logged as a pilot; 100 of them in powered aircraft, half of that 100 in airplanes; 100 hours of command time; and inside that command time, 50 hours in airplanes, plus 50 hours of cross-country flying, of which 10 must be airplane hours.
The specific flights are the ones people arrive missing. A two-hour daytime cross-country more than 100 nautical miles straight-line from where you departed. A two-hour night cross-country on the same distance. A 300-nautical-mile cross-country with landings at three points, one of them at least 250 nautical miles out. Five hours of night flying under visual flight rules containing ten takeoffs and ten landings at a towered airport. And three hours of test preparation inside the two calendar months before the month of the test.
Bring the logbook to us before you buy anything and we will read it against that list in about twenty minutes. It is free, it is more useful than any quote, and it occasionally saves somebody from paying for hours they already hold.
Which Requirements Catch People Out Most Often?
Five, in the order we see them. None of them is obscure; all of them are easy to read past when the paragraph is summarised instead of quoted.
The Instrument Hours Have A Sub-Rule
61.129(a)(3)(i) asks for ten hours of instrument training using a view-limiting device, and then adds that five of those ten must be in a single-engine airplane. Pilots who did their instrument work in a twin or largely in a simulator arrive short on that inner five, and it is a genuinely annoying discovery.
Night Landings Need A Control Tower
61.129(a)(4)(ii) wants five hours of night flying under visual flight rules with ten takeoffs and ten landings, with every landing flown off a circuit of the pattern, at an airfield whose control tower is open. Night circuits at an untowered field are good practice and do not satisfy this.
The Long Cross-Country Has Two Distances
61.129(a)(4)(i) sets a total distance of not less than 300 nautical miles and, separately, requires one landing point at least 250 nautical miles straight-line from the original departure point. Meeting the first without the second is the classic wasted afternoon.
The Three Preparation Hours Expire
61.129(a)(3)(v) puts three hours with an instructor inside the two calendar months preceding the month of the test. A checkride that slips by a few weeks can push those hours out of date, and they have to be flown again.
The Medical Is Not In 61.123
It sits in 61.23(a)(2), which asks for at least a second-class certificate to exercise commercial privileges. People plan around 61.123, complete it, and then discover the medical question late. Sit the higher class of examination at the beginning.
What Is The 300 Nautical Mile Cross-Country Requirement?
One flight, not several. 61.129(a)(4)(i) asks for a cross-country of not less than 300 nautical miles total distance, with landings at a minimum of three points, one of which is a straight-line distance of at least 250 nautical miles from the original departure point. The rule adds a Hawaii exception, where the longest segment need only be 150 nautical miles.
It may be flown solo, or while carrying out the duties of the pilot in command with an authorized instructor on board, because 61.129(a)(4) allows either. That flexibility exists for insurance and aircraft-checkout reasons, and it is worth knowing about before you assume you must be alone in the aircraft.
From Van Nuys the geometry is straightforward, which is a genuine advantage of training in Southern California. There are suitable airfields well beyond 250 nautical miles in several directions, and the leg planning becomes an exercise in fuel, weather and terrain rather than in finding somewhere far enough away. Plan it early. Pilots who leave this flight until the last month tend to fly it in poor conditions because the calendar has stopped negotiating.
What Are The Night Requirements For A Commercial Certificate?
Two separate paragraphs, often confused with each other. One is a cross-country; the other is a block of circuits at a towered field. You need both.
The Night Cross-Country
61.129(a)(3)(iv) asks for one two-hour cross-country flight in a single-engine airplane in nighttime conditions, with a total straight-line distance of more than 100 nautical miles out from where the flight began. It sits inside the twenty hours of training, so it is flown with an instructor.
- One flight, at night, in a single-engine airplane
- Two hours minimum
- More than 100 nautical miles straight-line from departure
- Counted inside the 20 training hours of 61.129(a)(3)
The Night Circuits
61.129(a)(4)(ii) is the one people underestimate: five hours in night visual flight rules conditions with ten takeoffs and ten landings, with every landing flown off a circuit of the pattern, at an airfield whose control tower is open.
- 5 hours, night, under visual flight rules
- 10 takeoffs and 10 landings
- Each landing preceded by a circuit of the pattern
- At an airfield whose control tower is open
Why The Tower Clause Matters Here
Van Nuys has an operating control tower, which removes the most common logistical problem with this requirement. It also means the flying is done inside a working Class D environment beneath the Class B shelf over Los Angeles, with real traffic and real radio work, which is harder and considerably more useful than ten quiet circuits somewhere empty.
Check the tower’s operating hours before you plan the flight. A tower that closes at ten in the evening turns a well-planned three-hour session into two hours of qualifying circuits and an hour of practice that does not count.
What Does Not Count
Landings flown at an untowered airport, however dark it was. Circuits flown at a towered field after the tower has closed for the night. Night time logged in a simulator, which is credited under the separate provisions of 61.129(i) rather than against this paragraph. Read the paragraph, log the flight against it, and note the tower status in the remarks column while you still remember.
What Does It Cost To Meet These Requirements?
It depends on what your logbook already holds, which is why the commercial phase is not sold as a standalone number here. These are the figures that do exist, fixed on the day you enroll.
Airline Career Track
Empty logbook to flight instructor rating, with the 250 hours of 61.129(a) inside the program rather than added afterwards.
- ✓Private, instrument, commercial and instructor phases
- ✓Every requirement on this page covered in sequence
- ✓Financing opens at $2,500 down
- ✓One figure, fixed at enrolment
Instrument Rating
Flown before the commercial phase so that its cross-country time counts toward 61.129(a)(2) as well.
- ✓Removes the 61.133(b)(1) limitation later
- ✓50 hours cross-country PIC under 61.65(d)
- ✓Redbird MCX time inside the program
Multi-Engine Add-On
The class rating that moves you from the requirements in 61.129(a) to the ones in 61.129(b).
- ✓Flown in the Piper Seminole
- ✓No aeronautical experience floor on an added class rating
- ✓Taken before or after the commercial checkride
What Can You Buy One At A Time?
Two single purchases and one program, for pilots who want to test the plan before signing anything larger.
Assessment Flight
An hour of dual instruction with you flying, ending in a written read on which requirements you have and which you do not.
- ✓Bring the logbook and we will audit it
- ✓Logged as dual instruction received
- ✓Credited against any program within a day
Redbird MCX Session
A standalone hour in the full-motion simulator, useful for procedures and instrument scan and poor for landings.
- ✓FAA-approved, fully enclosed and motion-equipped
- ✓Never cancelled for weather
- ✓Credit toward totals is governed by 61.129(i)
Private Pilot — Comprehensive
The prerequisite certificate 61.123(h) requires, priced against 60 logged hours rather than the 40-hour floor.
- ✓55 hours single-engine, 5 hours Redbird MCX
- ✓50 hours dual, 10 hours ground instruction
- ✓Books and training materials included
What Counts As A Complex Or Technically Advanced Airplane?
61.129(a)(3)(ii) asks for ten hours in a complex airplane, a turbine-powered airplane, or a technically advanced airplane, or any combination of those, appropriate to land or sea for the rating sought. Three routes to one requirement, and most training operations use the first.
A complex airplane, in ordinary use, is one with gear that retracts, flaps, and a propeller whose pitch you set. We fly the Piper Arrow II for this, and 61.31(e) adds its own condition: before you command a complex airplane you need ground and flight training in one, a finding that you are proficient, and a single logbook endorsement. The endorsement and the ten hours usually happen together.
The technically advanced definition is stricter than the marketing phrase glass cockpit. 61.129(j) requires an electronic primary flight display showing airspeed, turn coordination, attitude, heading, altitude and vertical speed; an electronic multifunction display with a GPS moving map showing the aircraft’s position; and a two-axis autopilot integrated with the navigation and heading guidance system. Those display elements must be continuously visible. Check any aircraft against that list before assuming the hours will count.
The Nine Conditions In 14 CFR 61.123
The eligibility paragraph in plain order. Every one of these has to be true before a certificate is issued, and none of them is negotiable.
At Least Eighteen Years Of Age
61.123(a). The knowledge test may be sat earlier — the FAA Airman Knowledge Testing Matrix shows sixteen for the CAX — but the certificate itself waits for your eighteenth birthday.
English Language Ability
61.123(b) asks that you read English, write it, speak it and understand it. Where a medical reason prevents one of those, the Administrator may place operating limitations on the certificate instead.
A Ground Training Endorsement
61.123(c). An authorized instructor either conducts the ground training on the areas in 61.125 or reviews your home study, and then certifies that you are prepared for the knowledge test.
A Knowledge Test Pass
61.123(d) sends you to the aeronautical knowledge areas in 61.125. For airplanes that is the CAX: 100 questions, two and a half hours, 70 to pass, per the FAA Airman Knowledge Testing Matrix.
A Flight Training Endorsement
61.123(e). Training on the areas of operation in 61.127(b) from an authorized instructor, who then certifies that you are prepared for the practical test.
The Aeronautical Experience
61.123(f) requires the experience for your category and class to be complete before you apply for the practical test. For airplane single-engine that is the whole of 61.129(a).
A Practical Test Pass
61.123(g), flown against the eleven areas of operation in 61.127(b)(1) and examined to the standards in FAA-S-ACS-7B.
A Private Pilot Certificate Already Held
61.123(h) requires at least a private pilot certificate issued under part 61, or that you meet 61.73, which is the route for military pilots.
And, Separately, A Medical Certificate
Not in 61.123 at all. 61.23(a)(2) requires at least a second-class medical certificate while exercising commercial pilot privileges, and it is the requirement people leave latest.
How Do Single-Engine And Multi-Engine Requirements Differ?
Two versions of the same certificate. The totals match; what changes is which airplane the training hours are flown in, and what that does to the cost.
Airplane Single-Engine
The version almost everybody trains under, and the one the rest of this page describes.
Best fora first commercial certificate, then a class rating added afterwards
- Total Hours250
- Long Cross-Country300 nm, 3 points
- Night Circuits10, towered
- Our AircraftPiper Warrior, Piper Arrow II
Airplane Multi-Engine
The same total experience arranged for a twin, with the training hours flown in a multi-engine airplane.
Best fora pilot with a specific multi-engine job in view
- Total Hours250
- Class Rating RouteAdd-on at $5,100
- Aeronautical Floor On Add-OnNone
- Our AircraftPiper Seminole
The Requirements Side By Side
| Requirement | Single-Engine Route | Multi-Engine Route |
|---|---|---|
| Governing paragraph | 14 CFR 61.129(a) | 14 CFR 61.129(b) |
| Total flight time | 250 hours | 250 hours |
| Pilot-in-command time | 100 hours | 100 hours |
| Where the training hours are flown | Single-engine airplane | Multi-engine airplane |
| Usual order here | Certificate first, class rating second | Class rating first, by exception |
| Aircraft we fly it in | Piper Warrior and Piper Arrow II | Piper Seminole |
Does Simulator Time Count Toward The 250 Hours?
Some of it, and the limits are written into 61.129(i), the paragraph headed permitted credit for use of a flight simulator or flight training device. Outside an approved course, an applicant for an airplane rating may credit a maximum of 50 hours of that training toward the total aeronautical experience requirements. Inside an approved course conducted under part 142, the ceiling rises to 100 hours.
Two things follow. First, simulator time is genuinely useful and genuinely capped, so a program built mainly around a box is not a route to a commercial certificate. Second, this is the same paragraph that carries the 190-hour provision at 61.129(i)(3), which applies only to somebody who has finished, to the required standard, a commercial course approved under part 142 — not part 141, and not here.
Our Redbird MCX has motion, encloses you completely and is FAA-approved as an advanced aviation training device, and we use it where it is good: procedures, instrument scan, emergency drills that would be unwise or impossible to rehearse in an aircraft. That class matters to the paragraph above. 61.129(i) is written for a full flight simulator or a flight training device, and on the airplane side of 61.129 an aviation training device is not named at all, so what this machine contributes toward the 250 hours comes from its own letter of authorization rather than from the 50-hour figure. It is poor at teaching landings, we say so on every page that mentions it, and we would rather sell you fewer simulator hours that are useful than more that are not.
What Backs Up A School’s Claim To Meet These Requirements?
Aircraft, instructors and published prices, all of them checkable by a stranger in an afternoon. We have no reviews of our own yet and we are not going to borrow anyone else’s.
Aircraft Types We Own Rather Than Broker
Cessna 162 Skycatcher, Piper Warrior, Piper Arrow II, Diamond DA20, Cirrus SR22 Turbo and Piper Seminole. The Arrow II covers 61.129(a)(3)(ii); the Seminole covers the multi-engine route.
Inspected under 14 CFR 91.409(b)Flight Instructors On The Roster
Each holds a commercial certificate or better, an instructor certificate, and a medical that is current; each of them is the legal commander of your training flights.
14 CFR 61.183 · 61.23Operating Control Tower On The Field
Van Nuys is towered, which is what 61.129(a)(4)(ii) requires for the ten night takeoffs and landings. Check the tower’s published hours before planning the flight.
Van Nuys Airport, KVNYDays The Weather Allowed Training
NOAA ASOS observations at Van Nuys, twelve months to 1 August 2026, counting only days holding five statute miles of visibility beneath a 3,000 foot ceiling across four qualifying daylight hours.
NOAA ASOS via the Iowa Environmental MesonetRequirements We Will Waive
None, and nobody else can either. A school that suggests a requirement can be worked around is describing something other than 14 CFR part 61.
14 CFR 61.123 · 61.129Commercial Pilot Requirements: Common Questions
14 CFR 61.123 sets them: at least eighteen years of age, English language ability, a ground training endorsement, a knowledge test pass on the areas in 61.125, a flight training endorsement, the aeronautical experience for your category and class, a practical test pass on the areas of operation in 61.127(b), and at least a private pilot certificate issued under part 61 or the equivalent under 61.73.
100 hours, under 14 CFR 61.129(a)(2). Inside that, 50 of those hours belong in airplanes, and another 50 must be cross-country, with 10 of the cross-country hours flown in airplanes. The ten hours in 61.129(a)(4) may be credited toward this requirement as well.
One cross-country flight of not less than 300 nautical miles total distance, with landings at a minimum of three points, one of which lies at least 250 nautical miles straight-line from the original departure point. It is set by 14 CFR 61.129(a)(4)(i), and in Hawaii the longest segment need only be 150 nautical miles.
Yes. 14 CFR 61.129(a)(4)(ii) requires five hours in night visual flight rules conditions with ten takeoffs and ten landings, with every landing flown off a circuit of the pattern, at an airfield whose control tower is open. Night circuits at an untowered field do not satisfy it, and neither do landings flown after the tower has closed.
An airplane with gear that retracts, flaps, and a propeller whose pitch you set. 14 CFR 61.129(a)(3)(ii) asks for ten hours in an airplane that is complex, turbine-powered or technically advanced, and 61.31(e) separately wants ground and flight training, plus one logbook endorsement, before you command such an airplane.
No. 14 CFR 61.129(j) is specific: an electronic primary flight display carrying airspeed, turn coordination, attitude, heading, altitude and vertical speed; an electronic multifunction display with a GPS moving map showing the aircraft’s position; and a two-axis autopilot integrated with the navigation and heading guidance system, with those display elements continuously visible.
No. An instrument rating is not among the requirements in 14 CFR 61.123 or 61.129. Without one in the same category and class, however, 61.133(b)(1) writes a limitation onto the certificate: passengers may not be carried for hire on a cross-country beyond 50 nautical miles, nor after dark.
They must be flown within the two calendar months that run up to the month of the practical test, under 14 CFR 61.129(a)(3)(v), in a single-engine airplane with an authorized instructor. If the checkride slips beyond that window, the three hours have to be flown again.
Twenty-four calendar months. The governing rule is 14 CFR 61.39(a)(1), which puts a knowledge test pass inside the 24-calendar-month period ending with the month of the applicant’s practical test.
Up to a point. 14 CFR 61.129(i) permits an applicant for an airplane rating to credit a maximum of 50 hours of training in a flight training device or a full flight simulator toward the total aeronautical experience, rising to a maximum of 100 hours where the training was completed in an approved course conducted under part 142.
The Limits Of What This Page Can Tell You
This page paraphrases and quotes 14 CFR part 61 as it stands today, and regulations change. Before you rely on any figure here, read the paragraph itself in the current Code of Federal Regulations. Where our wording and the regulation differ, the regulation is right and we would like to know about the error.
Airline Pilot Flight School is a part 61 flight training provider at Van Nuys Airport. It is not an airline, not owned by one, and holds no cadet scheme or hiring agreement with any carrier. No course here is an approved part 142 commercial pilot course, so the 190-hour provision in 61.129(i)(3) is not available at this school.
Nothing here is a promise of employment, and we publish no pass rate and no graduate count because the operation is new and neither number would mean anything yet. The curriculum, the price, the aircraft and the rule behind each requirement are published instead.
Third-party costs — the knowledge test, the examiner’s fee, your medical examination and your equipment — sit outside every program figure on this site. We do not set them, we do not collect them, and we do not quote them.
Bring Your Logbook And We Will Read It Against The Rule
Most of this page is arithmetic against columns you already own. The fastest way through it is to put the logbook on a table with an instructor beside it.
Come to 7900 Balboa Blvd at Van Nuys. Bring the logbook, and bring your medical certificate if you hold one. In about twenty minutes an instructor will total the columns that matter — pilot in command, cross-country, night, instrument, complex — and tell you which lines of 61.129(a) are already satisfied and which are not.
That conversation costs nothing and it changes the shape of the plan more often than people expect. Some pilots arrive believing they are two hundred hours away and are ninety. Others discover that the hours are there and the specific flights are not, which is a much cheaper problem to fix.
The Columns That Matter
Pilot-in-command time, cross-country time, night time, instrument training and complex time. Those five decide the price of this certificate more than anything else about you.
The Specific Flights
The two-hour day cross-country, the two-hour night cross-country, the 300 nautical mile trip and the ten towered night landings. These are the ones people arrive missing.
The Complex Airplane
The Piper Arrow II, where the ten hours in 61.129(a)(3)(ii) and the 61.31(e) endorsement are earned. Ask what it costs to operate, because your ten hours are made of that.
The Medical Question
61.23(a)(2) wants at least a second-class certificate. If you do not hold one, book the examination before you book anything else on this list.
We Will Name What Is Still Missing
An hour in the aircraft and a read of your logbook together tell you exactly which parts of 61.129 you have already flown and what the remainder would cost. That is a better basis for a decision than any figure worked out without seeing either.
Related Reading On The Commercial Certificate
Fly 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 →