Commercial pilot written exam
One hundred questions, seventy per cent to pass, and a result that stays usable for two years. It is the least expensive piece of a commercial certificate and the one most often left until it becomes inconvenient.
What is the commercial pilot written exam?
It is the Commercial Pilot Airplane knowledge test, test code CAX. The FAA Airman Knowledge Testing Matrix sets it at 100 questions with 70 required to pass and 2.5 hours allowed. You sit it at an FAA-approved knowledge testing center, on a computer, and you get your result before you leave.
The subject matter is not a mystery. 14 CFR 61.125(b) lists sixteen aeronautical knowledge areas, and every question on the test is traceable to one of them. Four of the sixteen do the heavy lifting for most candidates: weight and balance computation, performance charts, the significance of exceeding performance limitations, and the regulations that attach specifically to commercial privileges.
The difference from the private test is one of depth rather than breadth. You have met most of these topics before. What changes is that the commercial test expects you to compute rather than recognise: to work a weight and balance problem to a real answer, to pull a number off a chart and act on it, and to know what 14 CFR 61.133 does and does not let you be paid for.
Two administrative facts decide when you should sit it. Before you book, 14 CFR 61.123(c) wants a logbook endorsement from an authorized instructor confirming you have had ground training on the 61.125 areas, or evidence that you completed a home-study course. Afterwards, 14 CFR 61.39(a)(1) keeps the report usable across 24 calendar months counted back from the month you sit your practical test.
A position: take it early, during hour-building, not at the end. It is the only part of a commercial certificate you can complete on a rainy afternoon, and leaving it late means the checkride waits on a study problem rather than a flying one.
How does the commercial written differ from the instrument one?
Most people sit both inside eighteen months. They are different tests with different shapes, and confusing their preparation is a common way to waste a fortnight.
Commercial Pilot Airplane
Broader and more numerical. Performance, weight and balance, and the regulations governing paid flying.
Best forSat during hour-building, once the private certificate is behind you.
- Questions100
- Passing score70
- Allotted time2.5 hours
- Knowledge areas14 CFR 61.125(b)
Instrument Rating Airplane
Narrower and more procedural. Charts, clearances, approaches and the weather rules that surround them.
Best forSat close to the instrument training itself, while the procedures are live.
- Questions60
- Passing score70
- Allotted time2.0 hours
- Knowledge areas14 CFR 61.65(b)
The two tests side by side
| Commercial (CAX) | Instrument (IRA) | |
|---|---|---|
| Questions | 100 | 60 |
| Passing score | 70 | 70 |
| Allotted time | 2.5 hours | 2.0 hours |
| Subject list | 14 CFR 61.125(b), sixteen areas | 14 CFR 61.65(b) |
| Endorsement before booking | 14 CFR 61.123(c) | 14 CFR 61.65(a) |
| Report validity | 24 calendar months | 24 calendar months |
| Dominant skill | Computation from charts | Procedure and chart interpretation |
| When to sit it | Early, during hour-building | Alongside the instrument flying |
What subjects does the commercial written cover?
Sixteen knowledge areas, set out at 14 CFR 61.125(b). Grouped by what they actually demand of you, they fall into four families.
The numbers family
Weight and balance computations, use of performance charts, and the significance and effects of exceeding an aircraft’s performance limitations. This is the part that separates the commercial test from the private one, and it is the part that rewards practice rather than reading.
Density altitude belongs here in practice even though the rule files it under meteorology. At this field it is not theoretical: Van Nuys sits at 802 ft, and a hot September afternoon can make the airplane behave as though the field were several thousand feet higher. 14 CFR 91.103 makes takeoff and landing distance data part of your required preflight action, which is the regulation behind the arithmetic.
The rules family
The regulations that bear on commercial privileges, limitations and flight operations, plus the accident reporting requirements of the National Transportation Safety Board. Read 14 CFR 61.133 properly rather than skimming it: the limitation it places on a certificate held without an instrument rating is examinable and it is also the reason your instrument rating comes first.
The airmanship family
Basic aerodynamics and principles of flight, safe and efficient operation, aircraft systems, the maneuvers and emergency procedures appropriate to the aircraft, night and high-altitude operations, and aeronautical decision making and judgment. Familiar ground at greater depth.
The navigation family
Aeronautical charts and the magnetic compass for pilotage and dead reckoning, air navigation facilities, meteorology including critical weather recognition and windshear avoidance and the use of reports and forecasts, and procedures for operating inside the National Airspace System.
One area on the list, procedures for flight and ground training for lighter-than-air ratings, will not appear on an airplane test. It is in the section because 61.125 covers every category.
How do you prepare for and sit the test?
Five steps. None of them is difficult; the sequencing is what people get wrong.
Do the ground training, or the home study
You need a logbook endorsement, signed by an authorized instructor, recording ground training on the 61.125(b) areas — or evidence of a completed home-study course covering them. That is 14 CFR 61.123(c). Without one you cannot sit the test.
Work problems rather than reading chapters
The computational areas are the ones that fail people. Weight and balance and performance charts are skills, and the only way to build them is to do the problems until the method is automatic rather than remembered.
Book at an FAA-approved knowledge testing center
Bring government-issued photo identification. The test is delivered on a computer and scored immediately, so you leave with a printed report rather than waiting for one.
Keep the report safe
You present it when you apply for the practical test. 14 CFR 61.39(a) requires the knowledge test to have been passed inside the preceding 24 calendar months, so note the expiry against your training plan rather than in your memory.
If you fail, retest under 14 CFR 61.49
A failed test can be taken again after you receive additional training from an authorized instructor and an endorsement stating you are competent to pass it. There is no penalty beyond the delay and the fee, and it is not a career event.
What does the training around the written cost?
The fee goes to the testing center rather than to us, and no figure for it is published here. What is published is every program the ground training sits inside.
Comprehensive Private Pilot
Ten hours of ground instruction inside the program, which is where the habit of working problems properly gets built.
- ✓55 hours single-engine
- ✓5 hours Redbird MCX
- ✓10 hours ground
- ✓Books and materials included
Airline Career Track
Every phase to a commercial certificate and an instructor rating, with the ground training for each written test inside it.
- ✓Five phases, one figure
- ✓Financing from $2,500 down
- ✓Fixed before you start
Instrument Rating
The other written test on the route, and the rating that keeps a limitation off your commercial certificate.
- ✓Built on 14 CFR 61.65
- ✓IRA test preparation included
- ✓Fixed at enrolment
Redbird MCX session
Full-motion and enclosed. Where procedure work goes when the weather or the schedule will not cooperate.
- ✓Never scrubbed for weather
- ✓Good for procedures and scan
- ✓Poor for landings, and we say so
What stands behind the ground training here?
A written test is passed at a desk, but the teaching that gets you there is an operating standard like any other. These are ours.
Instructors who can give the endorsement
All eleven hold a commercial certificate or an ATP, an instructor certificate above that, and a current medical. The 61.123(c) endorsement comes from one of them after the ground training is actually done.
14 CFR 61.183 · 61.23Hours of ground instruction in the Comprehensive program
Ground hours are not simulator hours and the two are often confused. Comprehensive carries ten hours of ground and five hours in the Redbird; Standard and Premium carry three and two.
Program inclusions, published in fullA simulator session that turns a weather day into a training day
The Redbird MCX is full-motion and enclosed. Procedures and instrument scan work go well in it and landings do not, so we schedule it for the first and not the second.
$189 standaloneAircraft whose numbers you will actually be computing
Cessna 162 Skycatcher, Piper Warrior, Piper Arrow II, Diamond DA20, Cirrus SR22 Turbo, Piper Seminole. All of them ours. Weight and balance stops being abstract when the airplane is one you fly on Thursday.
Inspected under 14 CFR 91.409(b)Prices held back
None at all. Every program figure is printed on the site, without ranges, and nothing sits behind a request form.
Published in fullWhat this page is not
This is a description of a federal knowledge test, written for planning. The controlling sources are the current 14 CFR at eCFR and the FAA Airman Knowledge Testing Matrix, both of which change from time to time. Confirm the question count, the time allowance and the passing score against the matrix before you book.
This school teaches at Van Nuys Airport under part 61. It is not an airline, it is not owned by one, and has no cadet program, pathway agreement or hiring relationship with any carrier. Nothing here promises an interview, a job or a salary.
We publish no pass rate for any test, ours or the FAA’s. The school is new, the sample would be meaningless, and a percentage invented to fill the space would tell you nothing.
What people ask about the commercial written
One hundred. The FAA Airman Knowledge Testing Matrix lists the Commercial Pilot Airplane test under code CAX at 100 questions, with 70 as the passing score and 2.5 hours allowed. Check the current matrix before you book, because the FAA revises it.
Seventy. The report you receive lists the knowledge codes for anything you answered incorrectly, and an examiner may take you back through those areas when the practical test reaches its oral section. A bare pass is not a finished subject.
Twenty-four calendar months, and the rule is 14 CFR 61.39(a)(1): the knowledge test has to have been passed inside the 24 calendar months ahead of the month you sit your practical test. Sitting it very early in hour-building risks it expiring before your checkride.
Yes. 14 CFR 61.123(c) asks for a logbook endorsement from an authorized instructor confirming ground training on the aeronautical knowledge areas of 14 CFR 61.125, or evidence that you have completed a home-study course covering them.
Sixteen areas listed at 14 CFR 61.125(b), including the regulations attaching to commercial privileges, NTSB accident reporting, aerodynamics, meteorology and windshear, weight and balance, performance charts, aircraft systems, night and high-altitude operations, and operating inside the National Airspace System.
Different rather than harder. It is longer at 100 questions against 60, and it is more computational: weight and balance and performance charts carry real weight. Candidates who work problems rather than reading chapters generally find it straightforward.
During hour-building, once the private certificate is done. It is the only part of a commercial certificate that does not need an airplane, and completing it early means the checkride is never waiting on a study problem.
You retake it after receiving additional training from an authorized instructor and an endorsement certifying that you are competent to pass, under 14 CFR 61.49. The delay and the fee are the cost. Nothing is recorded against your certificate.
They are separate tests, sat separately, with separate endorsements. Most people take the instrument test alongside their instrument training and the commercial test during hour-building, which spreads the study rather than stacking it.
Yes, and it is inside the program price rather than an extra. The Comprehensive private program carries ten hours of ground instruction; the career track covers the ground training for each phase, including the preparation for both knowledge tests.
Related reading
Up to the pillar
Commercial pilot licenseGround study is cheap; flying badly prepared is not
Come and fly an hour with an instructor first. You will get a written read on where you are, what the sequence should be for you, and where the ground training fits around the flying. Enroll within a day of the flight and the fee comes off your program.
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 →