Cebu Pacific Pilot Requirements 2026: Hours, License and Hiring Process

Cebu Pacific, the Philippine low-cost airline, flies about 100 aircraft, Airbus A320s, A321s and A330neos and ATR 72 turboprops, from hubs in Manila, Cebu, Clark, Davao and Iloilo. At the last check, on 1 November 2026, we found no current pilot vacancy on Cebu Pacific’s own pages: the First Officer and Captain postings that surfaced were job boards’ copies, closed or undated, so both seats are unconfirmed. The lowest of them, a non-rated ATR 72 First Officer post from 500 hours total, with 25 hours multi-engine and the type training provided, was marked closed; the A320 and A330 First Officer copies wanted a type rating. The copies asked for a CPL with instrument and multi-engine ratings, a Class 1 medical and ICAO English Level 4. The route Cebu Pacific runs itself is its Cadet Pilot Program 2.0, a self-funded, 96-week course with Airworks Aviation Academy in Lapu-Lapu City, Cebu, with a Cebu Pacific pilot position promised on completion; its fifth batch, of 20 cadets, was launched in January 2026.

Is Cebu Pacific hiring pilots now?

Unconfirmed at the last check on 1 November 2026 — First Officer seat: Unconfirmed; Captain seat: Unconfirmed. No current pilot vacancy found on Cebu Pacific’s own pages: job boards’ copies, from a non-rated 500 h ATR 72 First Officer post to A320 and A330 rated ones, were closed or undated; the self-funded Cadet Pilot Program 2.0 took its fifth batch in January 2026

Requirements, as published

Reading the job boards’ copies line by line

Cebu Pacific’s careers site could not be read for this check, and no vacancy on it surfaced in search results on 1 November 2026, so the table above is built from job boards’ copies of Cebu Pacific postings, as search results showed them, and every one we found was closed or undated. Read them as a guide to what Cebu Pacific has asked for, not as an open door, and check the current posting before you apply.

• The non-rated door is the ATR. PilotsGlobal’s copy of an ATR 72 First Officer post, based in Cebu and permanent, asked for 500 hours total with 25 hours multi-engine, or, without multi-engine time, 2,000 hours on single-engine fixed-wing airplanes; no type rating, with the training provided; a radio license; and a willingness to be based outside Manila. It was marked closed, with no closing date shown, when checked on 30 October and 1 November 2026.
• The jets want a rating. PilotsGlobal’s copy of an A320-family First Officer post, marked closed in search results on 1 November 2026, asked for a type rating and 500 hours on type, a CPL with instrument and multi-engine ratings, a Class 1 medical, ICAO English Level 4 and a radio license, and said it was open to holders of ICAO licenses; its copy of an A330 First Officer post was closed too. FlightDeckFriend has also listed rated and non-rated A320 First Officers, undated.
• Captain minimums differ from copy to copy. FlightDeckFriend has carried undated copies of Cebu Pacific Captain posts, rated and non-rated, on the A320 and the ATR, and the hours that search results showed for them did not agree from one search to the next, so we state no Captain minimum. Whatever the copy, command takes an ATPL (below).
• The rules underneath. Philippine licenses are issued by the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines (CAAP) under Part 2 of the Philippine Civil Aviation Regulations, on personnel licensing, and on 10 January 2026 the CAAP issued a notice of proposed amendments to the pilot-license rules of that Part. Commanding a multi-pilot airliner takes an ATPL (the Library’s commercial and airline transport pilot licenses), and ICAO Annex 1, the international floor, asks an ATPL(A) applicant for at least 1,500 hours of flight time as a pilot of airplanes (2.6.3.1.1).
• Nationality is not stated. None of the copies we found says whether Cebu Pacific considers foreign pilots or sponsors work permits, so we could not confirm either.

Entry routes

• Direct entry First Officer ATR 72 (non-rated) — relayed by job boards; the PilotsGlobal copy was marked closed when checked on 30 October and 1 November 2026, with no closing date shown: 500 h total with 25 h multi-engine, base Cebu
• Direct entry First Officer A320 and A330 (type-rated) — job boards’ copies, closed or undated
• Cadet Pilot Program 2.0 — self-funded, 96 weeks, with Airworks Aviation Academy in Lapu-Lapu City, Cebu; a Cebu Pacific pilot position promised on completion; Batch 5 was launched in January 2026, and no current intake was found on 1 November 2026
• Direct entry Captain — A320 and ATR, in job boards’ copies, closed or undated, whose minimums differ

The Cadet Pilot Program 2.0

Cebu Pacific relaunched its cadet program in June 2024 with Airworks Aviation Academy, a flight school in Lapu-Lapu City, Cebu, and changed who pays. The program as reported at its launch and since, by JG Summit, Cebu Pacific’s parent company, and the aviation press, as we read them on 1 November 2026:

• Self-funded, with bank loans. Cadets pay for their training; Cebu Pacific arranged loans reserved for the program with the Bank of the Philippine Islands (BPI), which are also open to sponsors such as parents or guardians (JG Summit, June 2024). AvGeek Philippines, reporting the launch, said cadets sign a bond agreement on acceptance that commits them to at least ten years of service with Cebu Pacific; the group’s own release does not mention a bond, and we could not confirm it from a second source. We give no cost: the program’s fee is not on a price list we could read.
• 96 weeks, in three phases. A 4-week Aviation Foundation Course in Pasay, 68 weeks of basic flight training with Airworks in Lapu-Lapu City and 24 weeks of Airline Integration Training in Pasay (JG Summit, June 2024; afm.aero, August 2026). Cadets who complete the program are promised a position as a pilot with Cebu Pacific.
• Batches of about 20. Batch 5, 20 cadets, was launched in January 2026 (afm.aero, 7 January 2026). Batch 2 graduated 19 cadets in April 2026 and Batch 3 17 on 28 August 2026, bringing to 56 the cadets of the first three batches who had completed the Airworks phase (afm.aero, August 2026). The program set out to train 240 to 300 pilots over five years. We found no application window for a batch after Batch 5 at the last check.
• Not the old program. Many articles describe Cebu Pacific’s earlier cadet scheme, launched in 2017 with Flight Training Adelaide in Australia: Cebu Pacific financed that training and cadets repaid it through salary deduction over up to ten years (AviationUpdatesPH, reporting the launch in October 2017). Its terms are not those of the current program.

Cebu Pacific also trains its crews itself: in April 2026 it opened the Cebu Pacific Training Academy in Parañaque City, a training facility for pilots and cabin crew with Airbus A330 and ATR door trainers, cabin mock-ups and slide trainers (Cebu Pacific’s release, 28 April 2026).

Cebu Pacific beside its Asia-Pacific peers

Cebu Pacific beside the airlines it is compared with on our jobs board, as recorded at each airline’s last check:

Read each row with its date. Cathay Pacific’s Cadet Pilot Programme was open year-round while its Direct Entry Second and First Officer routes were not hiring (30 October 2026); Singapore Airlines had its ab-initio cadet route open in Singapore while its rated A350 and A380 contracts were closed (30 October 2026); IndiGo’s careers page listed cadet, type-rated, non-type-rated and expatriate pilot tracks, with no dated 2026 vacancy notice (14 October 2026); and in the Qantas Group, QantasLink was not accepting pilot applications (23 October 2026). AirAsia, which also flies from Manila and is not in the table, showed no pilot vacancy on its own pages, only job boards’ copies of 500-hour A320 First Officer posts, closed or undated (31 October 2026).

Selection process

The airline does not publish its selection stages in detail; expect an online application, screening against the published minimums, an interview and a simulator or aptitude assessment before the medical.

Bases and fleet

Bases: Manila · Cebu · Clark · Davao · Iloilo

Fleet: Airbus A320s (ceo and neo), A321s, A330neos and ATR 72 turboprops: about 100 aircraft after the 15th A330neo arrived in Manila on 10 October 2026, 38 A320s, 27 A321s, 15 A330neos and 20 ATRs, with new-engine (neo) aircraft 78% of the jet fleet (AeroTime and the Daily Tribune, October 2026) · Deliveries in 2026: seven new-engine (neo) aircraft expected in the year, among them four A320neos, the third of which arrived on 11 September 2026, and the 15th A330neo, the year’s first wide-body; the airline aims at an all-neo jet fleet by 2030 (AeroTime, September and October 2026) · On order: up to 102 A321neos, at least 70 of them firm, with options for 50 more A320neo-family aircraft, under the agreement with Airbus reported on 2 October 2024, with first deliveries in 2029 (ch-aviation, 2 October 2024; Philstar, 4 October 2024)

How to prepare

Prepare for the route you can actually apply for, and check that it is open first. Without a license, that is the Cadet Pilot Program 2.0: a 4-week Aviation Foundation Course in Pasay, 68 weeks of basic flight training with Airworks in Lapu-Lapu City and 24 weeks of Airline Integration Training in Pasay. At the 2024 launch, Cebu Pacific’s parent group described the selection as a panel interview with Cebu Pacific, then a medical assessment at a partner health facility, before cadets are assigned to a training batch (JG Summit, June 2024); the screening of the earlier, 2017 program included pilot aptitude tests (AviationUpdatesPH, October 2017). So prepare with the Library’s competency-based pilot interviews and pilot aptitude tests, read medical certification before the medical, and book the Class 1 examination early. With a license, the job boards’ copies point to the ATR 72 for non-rated First Officers and to the A320 and A330 for rated ones. The ATR 72 bank covers the turboprop’s systems, its -600 flight deck and what changed from the -500, and the A320 bank below covers the Airbus narrow-bodies that make up most of the jet fleet; with new-engine aircraft 78% of the jets in October 2026, read the Library’s A320neo and A320ceo differences too. v1prep has no A330 bank: the ATPL theory banks cover the theory behind it. For flying in the tropics, revise tropical revolving storms, thunderstorms and windshear and microbursts, and, for the ATR, propellers and propeller control. Every copy asked for ICAO English Level 4; the Library’s pilot licensing framework explains the levels and how often they are re-tested.

Cebu Pacific has no interview guide on v1prep yet, so for the selection read the complete airline pilot interview guide and the Library’s airline pilot recruitment and selection and pilot career pathways. How cadet schemes compare, and who pays for them, is on our cadet pilot programs page. The ATR route is on turboprop pilot jobs, the Airbus fleet on A320 pilot jobs, and the region’s other airlines on pilot jobs in Asia-Pacific, among them AirAsia, which also flies A320s from Manila. Check Cebu Pacific’s entry on the jobs board for the latest status.

What we could not confirm

• Researched on 1 November 2026 from search-engine results of the airline’s own pages and releases, aviation press and job boards’ copies of its postings — not from a direct read of the careers portal. Confirm the vacancy is still open before you apply.
• Whether any direct-entry pilot vacancy is open on Cebu Pacific’s own careers site: none surfaced on 1 November 2026, and the job boards’ copies were closed or undated
• Expatriate eligibility, and whether Cebu Pacific sponsors work permits for foreign pilots
• The current minimums for Captains: the job boards’ copies, closed or undated, differ
• Whether applications are open for a cadet batch after Batch 5, which was launched in January 2026, and the program’s current age and education conditions
• The length and terms of the cadet bond (at least ten years in AvGeek Philippines’ report of the 2024 launch; not in Cebu Pacific’s group release) and the program’s cost
• Which of the hubs base pilots: crew bases are not published
• How many pilots Cebu Pacific employs or plans to hire now: its aim of 1,500 more pilots dates from October 2023

These points are not published clearly by the airline. Treat them as leads, not facts, and confirm them on the careers page: careers page.

Common questions

Is Cebu Pacific hiring pilots? We could not confirm it at the last check, on 1 November 2026. No pilot vacancy on Cebu Pacific’s own careers site surfaced in search results, and the First Officer and Captain postings we found were job boards’ copies, closed or undated. The route Cebu Pacific runs itself is its self-funded Cadet Pilot Program 2.0, whose fifth batch was launched in January 2026. Check Cebu Pacific’s careers page before you apply.

How many flight hours do you need to fly for Cebu Pacific? Cebu Pacific had no current published minimum at the last check, on 1 November 2026. The lowest figure in the job boards’ copies is a closed non-rated ATR 72 First Officer post: 500 hours total with 25 hours multi-engine, or 2,000 hours on single-engine airplanes without multi-engine time. A type-rated A320 First Officer copy asked for 500 hours on type. A Captain needs an ATPL, for which ICAO Annex 1 sets a floor of 1,500 hours.

Does Cebu Pacific have a cadet pilot program? Yes. The Cadet Pilot Program 2.0, run since June 2024 with Airworks Aviation Academy in Lapu-Lapu City, Cebu, is self-funded and lasts 96 weeks, with loans from BPI for cadets or their sponsors and a pilot position with Cebu Pacific promised on completion; one report of the launch also described a bond of at least ten years, which we could not confirm. Batch 5, 20 cadets, was launched in January 2026; we found no open application window for a later batch on 1 November 2026.

Does Cebu Pacific hire foreign pilots? We could not confirm it. None of the job boards’ copies of Cebu Pacific postings we found states a nationality or work-permit condition; one copy of an A320 First Officer post said it was open to holders of ICAO licenses. Ask Cebu Pacific’s recruitment team before you apply from abroad.

What aircraft does Cebu Pacific fly? About 100 aircraft in October 2026: 38 A320s, 27 A321s, 15 A330neos and 20 ATR turboprops, with new-engine aircraft 78% of the jet fleet after the 15th A330neo arrived on 10 October 2026 (AeroTime). On order are up to 102 A321neos, at least 70 of them firm, with options for 50 more A320neo-family aircraft, under the agreement with Airbus reported on 2 October 2024 (ch-aviation), with deliveries from 2029.