UK Civil Aviation Authority Opens Consultation on VTOL Regulations Ahead of Commercial Flight Target by End of 2028

A con­sul­ta­tion has been launched by the UK Civ­il Avi­a­tion Author­i­ty (UK CAA), which sets out pro­pos­als on how the coun­try will reg­u­late VTOL air­craft and their oper­a­tions.

The doc­u­ment, which is open until Thurs­day, Jan­u­ary 29th, 2026, also includes pro­pos­als on the reg­u­la­to­ry frame­works for pilot licens­ing, land­ing sites and aero­dromes, air­wor­thi­ness and flight oper­a­tions.

Some of the top-lev­el pro­pos­als in the con­sul­ta­tion include:

• Clas­si­fy­ing these new air­craft as either ‘Pow­ered-Lift’ or ‘Non-Con­ven­tion­al Heli­copters’
• Devel­op­ing a pilot licens­ing frame­work based on exist­ing require­ments, includ­ing an option for a pri­vate pilot licence for non-com­mer­cial fly­ing
• Putting in place oper­a­tional rules for com­mer­cial fly­ing, using exist­ing heli­copter and aero­plane require­ments as far as is pos­si­ble
• Adapt­ing rules for land­ing sites and aero­dromes where required for the dif­fer­ences in VTOL air­craft. We also pro­pose to allow oper­a­tions from unli­censed aero­dromes if the oper­a­tor has per­mis­sion to do so.

Sophie O’Sullivan, Direc­tor of Future Safe­ty and Inno­va­tion at the UK Civ­il Avi­a­tion Author­i­ty, said: “We’re work­ing to facil­i­tate the safe intro­duc­tion of VTOL air­craft in the UK. This con­sul­ta­tion pro­pos­es the reg­u­la­to­ry frame­work need­ed to sup­port com­mer­cial flights from 2028.

“We need to hear from every­one involved in the intro­duc­tion of these new air­craft to help shape the UK’s approach.”

The UK CAA has set a tar­get to have the rules and reg­u­la­tions in place to allow com­mer­cial pas­sen­ger VTOL flights by the end of 2028 and the pro­pos­als also aim to utilise exist­ing avi­a­tion reg­u­la­tions as far as pos­si­ble.

This will help these new air­craft suc­cess­ful­ly inte­grate into the avi­a­tion sys­tem, while ensur­ing com­pat­i­bil­i­ty with inter­na­tion­al rules.

Fol­low­ing feed­back on this con­sul­ta­tion, the UK CAA will issue fur­ther con­sul­ta­tions on the detailed reg­u­la­to­ry word­ing and asso­ci­at­ed guid­ance next year and sub­mit our rec­om­men­da­tions for leg­isla­tive change to the gov­ern­ment.

The con­sul­ta­tion is avail­able to view on the UK CAA’s web­site.