The FAA Counts 887,519 US Pilots. More Than 4 in 10 Hold a Student Certificate That Never Expires

The FAA counted 887,519 active pilots on December 31, 2025, in its annual U.S. Civil Airmen Statistics. That is the highest total in a table that runs back to 1927.

It looks like a boom, and part of it is. But 370,286 of those pilots, about 42%, hold a student certificate, and since April 2016 new student certificates have had no expiration date.

How Many Pilots Are in the US?

The FAA’s answer is 887,519 as of the end of 2025. Take out the students and it is 517,233, the highest since 2009 but still 110,005 below the 627,238 of 1980.

In FAA terms, an active pilot holds both a pilot certificate and a valid medical certificate, except glider pilots, who need no medical exam. Each pilot is counted once, under their highest certificate, so the groups add up to the total.

Limit it to people living in the US and the figure is 856,838. Another 30,680 FAA-certificated pilots live abroad or have an address the FAA cannot identify.

US pilots by certificate type

The FAA sorts pilots by the highest certificate they hold, from student up to airline transport. Our guide to the types of pilot licenses explains what each one allows.

Students are more than double the next group. The other surprise is one step down: the top certificate, airline transport, is more common than the entry-level private certificate, 181,742 to 174,155.

The rotorcraft row looks small because it only covers pilots with no airplane certificate. A separate FAA table counts 28,759 active pilots holding a rotorcraft certificate of any kind.

Why the numbers differ

The student effect. The FAA’s own footnote says the no-expiration rule generates a cumulative increase in the numbers. That is why ranges like 500,000 to 700,000 still appear online, and why 517,233 is the better figure if you mean fully certificated pilots.

The old count. 848,770 is the FAA’s figure for the end of 2024, and pages that have not been updated still quote it. The FAA counts once a year, as of December 31.

Jobs against certificates. The Bureau of Labor Statistics counted about 154,900 pilot jobs in 2025: 104,600 airline pilots, copilots and flight engineers, plus 50,400 commercial pilots. Airline pay goes to that smaller group, not to all 181,742 airline transport certificate holders.

Age is part of that gap. Of 188,656 pilots whose highest certificate is airline transport in any aircraft, 28,528 were 65 or older, about 15%, and federal rules bar anyone past their 65th birthday from flying as a pilot in Part 121 airline operations.

Who is left out. Drone pilots are excluded, and adding them would double count anyone who holds both certificates. Military pilots appear only if they also hold an FAA certificate, which they can apply for based on their military qualifications.

A possible undercount. Federal rules let a private pilot fly under listed conditions without an FAA medical certificate, the option known as BasicMed. Read literally, the FAA’s definition of active leaves out such a pilot once their medical lapses, though the workbook does not say how many that affects.

How the number got here

The total hit 584,362 in 2016, its lowest since at least 1987. It has risen every year since, adding 303,157 pilots by 2025, and 241,785 of those, about 80%, were student certificates.

It was not the first time a rule moved this number. A July 2010 rule stretched validity for student pilots under 40 from 36 to 60 months, and the student count jumped from 72,280 to 119,119 in a year.

New student certificates alone do not explain the climb. The FAA issued 69,503 in 2023 and 58,762 in 2025, a drop, yet the student total kept rising because the certificates do not lapse.

The growth above the student level is real, though. Pilots without student certificates are up 61,372 since 2016, and commercial pilots alone rose by 8,587 in 2025, which matters for the pilot shortage debate.

Earning those certificates takes years, as our look at how long it takes to become an airline pilot shows. The next FAA count will be dated December 31, 2026.

Who the 887,519 are

The average active pilot was 42.1 years old at the end of 2025. Students averaged 35.8 and airline transport pilots 50.2.

Women reached 100,704 active pilots in 2025, up from 91,694 a year earlier, or 11.3% of the total. Without students their share is 7.7%, and it is 5.7% among airline transport pilots, a gap that the most famous female pilots faced in far starker form.

Florida has the most pilots at 97,112. Texas and California are just 17 apart in second and third, at 82,454 and 82,437, but Texas has 20,490 airline transport pilots to California’s 12,980.