Fly.hr analysed 102 current pilot vacancies from 48 employers and found that only 12 adverts—11.8% of the sample—published a hard numerical recency window. Where a number was stated, the window ranged from six to 36 months, with a median of 12 months.
That is the headline, but it is not the whole result. Some employers asked for a date of last flight without publishing a cutoff. Others required a current rating, accepted an expired rating under transition rules, or used phrases such as “currently or recently operated” without attaching a number. Treating all of those as the same requirement would make the data look cleaner and the advice worse.
I collected the vacancy data on 28 September 2026 because total time alone does not explain whether an experienced pilot can submit a competitive application today. A pilot may have thousands of hours on an aircraft and still fall outside a recency screen; another may be accepted as non-type-rated and routed through different training.
The findings at a glance
| Finding | Result |
|---|---|
| Usable vacancy observations | 102 from 48 employers |
| Any published recency wording | 18 of 102 (17.6%) |
| Hard numerical recency window | 12 of 102 (11.8%) |
| Numerical window | 6–36 months; median 12 months |
| Published on-type-hour threshold | 16 of 102; median 500 hours |
| On-type-hour range | 100–3,000 hours |
| Explicit current-rating requirement | 12 of 102 |
| Any type-rating gate, including currency not stated | 36 of 102 (35.3%) |
Download the 102-row vacancy dataset (CSV). Each row preserves the employer URL, access date, evidence excerpts and interpretation notes.
Methodology: a vacancy is not a pilot headcount
I began with 180 active pilot vacancies in the public WingJobs feed. WingJobs was used to discover current adverts; it was not treated as the authority for the requirements. I followed the link to each employer page and preserved the published wording.
Large campaigns can post several near-identical adverts. To reduce that bias, I kept one observation for each operator × role × aircraft combination. This produced 113 rows. I then excluded 11 rows from a single employer page that mixed several vacancies in a way that made it unsafe to attribute a sentence to one role. The analysed sample is therefore 102 observations from 48 employers.
The unit is a vacancy, not an airline and not a number of available seats. One advert may recruit several pilots. The sample is a cross-section of vacancies discoverable on one date, weighted neither by fleet size nor hiring volume.
I coded five concepts separately:
- a hard numerical recency window;
- a minimum number of hours flown inside that window;
- a qualitative recent-experience requirement;
- a request for the last-flight date without a published cutoff; and
- rating status: current required, rating required with currency unstated, flexible, preferred, or not required.
Blank means “not published or not safely attributable,” never zero. Requirements can change or disappear when a campaign closes, which is why the collection date and source text matter.
Finding 1: 82.4% of adverts published no recency rule
Eighteen of the 102 observations disclosed something about recent flying or currency. The other 84 did not. That does not mean those employers ignore recency. It means the public advert did not give an applicant a rule that could be coded.
This distinction matters for career advice. “The advert does not specify recent hours” is defensible. “The airline has no recency requirement” is not. An application form, recruiter screen or later document check may still ask for the last flight, LPC expiry or recent sectors.
Three application pages in the sample asked for the date of the applicant’s last flight on type but did not publish a pass/fail threshold. One used a qualitative requirement for current or recent multi-crew operation. Two SmartLynx listings said currency was preferred but explicitly welcomed applications even when the rating had not been current for more than three years. Those six observations are meaningful disclosures, but they are not hard numerical gates.
Finding 2: the numerical cutoff ranged from six to 36 months
Among the 12 vacancies with a hard window, the median was 12 months. The shortest was six months and the longest 36 months.
| Employer / role | Published recency rule | Window |
|---|---|---|
| BA Cityflyer captain pathway | Recent on previous type | 6 months |
| British Airways senior first officer | Flying on a relevant type | 12 months |
| Bulgaria Air first officer | 200 flight hours | 12 months |
| Etihad first officer | A320-family flying | 12 months |
| Qatar Executive captain | Last jet flight | 12 months |
| Ryanair Group A320-rated first officer | Rating validity and operation on family | 36 months |
The 36-month examples also show why “current” can be an unhelpfully blunt label. Ryanair’s published wording does not simply stop at a current/expired switch. It describes when a rating or aircraft operation outside the stated thresholds moves a candidate into transition training or non-type-rated treatment.
Finding 3: some employers measure activity inside the window
Four observations combined a time window with a minimum amount of recent flying. Three Riyadh Air listings required 150 hours in the previous 12 months; the captain versions specified those hours in command. Bulgaria Air required 200 hours flown in the previous 12 months for its A220 first-officer vacancy.
This is a different screen from “last flight within 12 months.” A pilot could have flown last month and still fail a 150- or 200-hour activity requirement. Conversely, a pilot with substantial recent activity might still need the specified licence, medical, type or aircraft category.
For anyone maintaining an application tracker, the practical lesson is to record at least three dates or totals separately: last flight, hours in the last 12 months, and rating/LPC expiry. One “current: yes/no” field loses information employers actually request.
Finding 4: the median published on-type threshold was 500 hours
Sixteen of the 102 observations published a safely attributable on-type or relevant-type threshold. The median was 500 hours. The range was unusually wide: 100 to 3,000 hours.
| Published threshold | Examples in the sample | What the number represented |
|---|---|---|
| 100 hours | Jet2 A320 and B737 multi-rank adverts | Lowest advertised entry band, for Second Officer |
| 200–250 hours | Elit’Avia Falcon 6X; Avcon Jet King Air 360 captain | Hours on type |
| 500 hours | Etihad FO criterion A; Gama G650; Marathon E-Jet; Avcon Challenger | Hours on type, sometimes with rank or PIC context |
| 800 hours | Ryanair B737 and A320-family pathways | Threshold affecting rated/non-rated treatment |
| 1,000–1,500 hours | Jet2 captain adverts; Etihad A320 captain | PIC or family-specific experience |
| 3,000 hours | British Airways senior first officer | Hours on a relevant aeroplane type |
The median is more useful than the mean here. A few senior, type-specific positions pull the average upward, while entry bands and transition rules sit much lower. Even the median must not be read as a universal target: role, aircraft, rank and training route explain much of the spread.
Finding 5: recency was more explicit outside the European subset
The dataset contains 71 European observations and 31 from the Middle East or other markets. Nine of the 31 non-European observations published a numerical recency window, compared with three of 71 European observations: 29.0% versus 4.2% in this sample.
This is an observed sample difference, not proof that one region is universally stricter. The non-European group includes several large Gulf recruitment campaigns with detailed experience formulas, while many European observations came from regional, ACMI and business-aviation pages. Different employer mix could produce a different result on another date.
A type rating and current experience are separate gates
Thirty-six observations had some form of type-rating gate: a current rating, a required rating with currency unstated, or a published flexibility rule. Only 12 explicitly required a current rating. Twenty-two said a rating was not required. The remaining observations were unstated, preferred, flexible or ambiguous.
That is why self-funding a rating based only on a job title is risky. A rating may be required but insufficient without hours on type; it may be preferred but not essential; or the employer may accept a non-type-rated applicant into a different course. Read the exact advert and verify it again before spending money.
Low-hour pilots should also distinguish these experienced-hire findings from cadet recruitment. Our guide to how low-time pilots get airline jobs in Europe covers the entry routes, while the frozen ATPL guide explains the licence terminology. For assessment preparation, use the airline pilot interview guide.
What candidates should record before applying
- Total time and PIC time, with simulator time separated where the advert excludes it.
- Hours on the exact type and on any accepted family or “similar sized” category.
- Hours flown in the last six and 12 months.
- Date of last flight on type and date of last commercial flight.
- Type-rating and instrument-rating validity dates.
- Last LPC/OPC and the authority that issued the licence.
- The exact vacancy URL and the date its requirements were checked.
Limitations
This is a dated vacancy sample, not a census of airlines or hires. Ads can be edited or removed. Public wording may omit internal screening rules. Repeated campaigns were deliberately collapsed, so the figures describe distinct operator-role-aircraft offers rather than advertising volume. Eleven ambiguous rows were excluded instead of guessing which requirement belonged to which position.
The sample also combines airlines, ACMI operators and business-aviation employers. That breadth reveals how varied the market is, but it should not be used to predict one named airline’s future campaign. The reproducible claim is narrower: among 102 usable vacancies collected on 28 September 2026, 12 published a numerical recency window, and those windows ranged from six to 36 months.
Use the research in your application
State your experience date and last flight clearly with the pilot CV guide and free template. If you are considering a new rating, the type-rating decision guide helps separate course completion from the experience a vacancy requests. The study above remains a dated sample, not a live vacancy list.
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