Writing a Pilot CV and Application

A pilot CV is usually the first document an airline sees, read alongside an online application form and scans of the licence, the medical and the logbook. It summarises the licences and ratings, the medical and language level, the flight hours by category, and the employment and training history, and it may come with a cover letter. Airlines screen it largely on numbers: whether the candidate meets the published minimums for the role, and how the experience compares with other applicants'. A CV whose figures differ from the logbook or the form raises a doubt that the interview then has to dispel.

This article covers the content and layout of a pilot CV and application. The selection that follows is described in airline pilot recruitment and selection, and the logging rules behind every number on the CV in flight time logging and recent experience.

What airlines screen for

The first screen is eligibility. Each vacancy lists minimums, and some airlines say plainly that they apply them: KLM advises candidates who do not meet its published criteria not to apply, and Norwegian requires every licence and medical to be valid and current at the time of application. The usual criteria are:

• Licence and ratings: an ATPL, or a CPL with a multi-engine instrument rating and the ATPL theory passes, MCC training and, at some airlines, UPRT certificates or a type rating on a multi-pilot aeroplane, which KLM requires before an application.
• Hours: total time, and often time on a type or on aircraft above a stated mass, as pilot in command or in multi-crew operations, with recent hours.
• Medical: a Class 1 certificate, at Emirates with no limitation other than visual correction.
• Language: an ICAO English level, from Level 4 at many airlines to Level 6 at KLM, sometimes with a second language, such as French at Air France or Dutch at KLM.
• Right to work in the country or region of the bases.

The second screen ranks the eligible. TAP published the method for its November 2025 pilot competition: points for A319, A320 and A321 experience and its recency, total hours weighted by aircraft complexity, completed degrees and an English level of 5 or 6, ranked on the application file alone.

Structure of a pilot CV

Few airlines prescribe a layout, but screeners look for the same things in the same places, and a conventional order helps them:

In the United States the convention is a single page with no photograph, no objective statement and no list of hobbies, matched field by field to the application form. Conventions vary elsewhere, but the same discipline works: a short profile of facts rather than adjectives, the numbers where the screener looks first, and nothing that a document cannot support.

Licences, ratings and medical

The licence line names the licence, its category and the issuing authority, for example an ATPL(A) issued by an EASA member state, or a CPL(A) with the ATPL theory complete, the frozen ATPL (see commercial and airline transport pilot licences). FAA certificates are listed as issued, such as a commercial pilot certificate with airplane multiengine land and instrument ratings. Every item with a validity carries its expiry date, because screeners check them (see class and type ratings and medical certification):

The licence itself does not expire, so the dates that matter are those of the ratings, the medical and the language endorsement. FAA certificates and their ratings do not expire at all. Courses go next to the ratings: MCC and, where completed, a jet orientation course, UPRT and the operator's initial CRM course (see MCC and jet orientation courses). KLM asks for the MCC and UPRT certificates with the application, Wizz Air requires a jet orientation or APS MCC course of non-type-rated experienced first officers who have not flown a jet, and Air France asks applicants without a first CS-25 type rating for an advanced UPRT certificate.

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Flight hours and experience

The hours table is the part screeners read first. It should give, as of a stated date, the categories the airline asks for, each traceable to the logbook:

The airline's own definitions decide what counts, and they differ. Wizz Air excludes simulator hours from all its figures. Ryanair's non-type-rated experienced first officers need 500 hours as first officer on multi-crew, multi-engine aircraft in commercial air transport, with instructing hours excluded. Emirates counts first officers' total time on jets of at least 20 tonnes for its Boeing 777 stream and 50 tonnes for its Airbus stream, excluding time as third pilot (P3), rotary-wing and piston time, and wants 150 hours on type in the last 12 months. KLM's 2026 Martinair freighter vacancy excluded hours flown as cruise relief co-pilot, and Southwest asks for a grid of flight hours by aircraft. A CV that gives the totals in the airline's own categories saves the screener a calculation and the candidate a misunderstanding. Totals are never rounded up.

PIC and co-pilot time need particular care, because the two systems define them differently. Under Part-FCL, PICUS is time in which a co-pilot performs the duties of the pilot in command under supervision; it is credited towards the ATPL but is not PIC time, and Wizz Air states that the PIC hours it requires of type-rated direct-entry captains do not include PICUS. Under 14 CFR 61.51(e) an FAA pilot may log PIC time chiefly as sole manipulator of the controls of an aircraft for which he or she is rated, as sole occupant, or when acting as pilot in command where more than one pilot is required. A total that mixes the two systems invites questions.

Employment history and education

Flying jobs go in reverse chronological order: dates, employer, aircraft, role, and one or two lines of duties or achievements, such as becoming a line training captain, an instructor or a member of a safety committee. Non-flying jobs belong on the CV too, because they show responsibility, teamwork or customer contact, and because background checks verify employment history, gaps included. A gap is better explained in a line on the CV than discovered by the checks.

Education follows: the flight training course and school, the ATPL theory, then degrees and school qualifications. Some airlines weigh them: TAP's November 2025 competition gave 4 points for a degree that included mathematics or physics and 2 for other degrees, and KLM prefers graduates of named flight schools. References are often requested, Aer Lingus asking for two verifiable ones, and referees should be asked before they are named. Candidates at US airlines are advised to bring two or three letters of recommendation to the interview, ideally from a captain, chief pilot or check airman.

The cover letter and online forms

Where an airline asks for a cover letter or motivation letter, as Air France, KLM and Norwegian do, it is a statement of motivation and also a sample of the candidate's writing. One page is enough: the role and base applied for; two or three specific reasons for choosing this airline; the evidence that the candidate meets the requirements and brings something more, drawn from the CV without repeating it; and availability. It must be written in the language asked for, which at Air France is French for both the CV and the letter. A letter written for one airline and sent to another with the old name left in is an avoidable mistake.

Most applications now go through online forms. Wizz Air sends a separate pilot scoring form whose mandatory fields must all be completed, and the AOC chosen at application cannot be changed later. easyJet takes applications for one base at a time and will not review one until the passport, the CV with a full breakdown of flying hours, the licence, the Class 1 medical and the last three pages of the logbook have all been uploaded. The figures typed into a form must be the same as those on the CV.

Consistency with the logbook

The logbook is the evidence behind every figure. Part-FCL requires each pilot to keep a reliable record of all flights flown and to present it on request; the FAA's 14 CFR 61.51 requires the training and experience used for certificates, ratings, flight reviews and recency to be logged. Airlines check it at several points:

• At application: copies of pages, the last three at easyJet, the first and last two at Enter Air, the last two certified on honour with an employer certificate at Air France.
• At assessment: Emirates requires complete certified logbook records, stamped by a fleet manager or chief pilot or backed by a stamped letter from the airline or the authority.
• Before the start date: Sun Country's logbook audit must prove its minimums, and some US airlines review logbooks at the interview and again at the class date.

The problems that hurt are predictable: totals that differ from the application or change between application and class date, missing endorsements, unsigned or undated entries, arithmetic errors, gaps that suggest a lost logbook, and time that looks padded, such as PIC logged when the pilot was neither sole manipulator nor acting as pilot in command. A pilot with an electronic logbook should bring a printed summary and be able to explain how each category was logged. In the United States a false entry in a logbook or an application is itself a violation of 14 CFR 61.59, and anywhere a discrepancy between declared and recorded experience can cost the offer (see airline pilot recruitment and selection).

Common mistakes

• Figures that do not match: CV, form and logbook giving different totals, or totals rounded up.
• Categories that do not match the airline's: simulator time counted as type time, PICUS presented as PIC, instructing hours offered as multi-crew experience.
• Missing or past dates: a rating, medical or language level without its expiry date, or already expired.
• Incomplete applications: documents missing at the deadline, or scans that cannot be read.
• Padding: adjectives instead of facts, an objective statement, a photograph where none is wanted.
• Careless errors: spelling mistakes, the wrong airline's name, dates that do not agree.
• Silence about problems: a failed check, a gap or a dismissal left for the background check to find, when a line on the CV and a prepared answer at interview would have served better (see competency-based pilot interviews).

Library articles are written for study and exam preparation. They do not replace your aircraft's approved documentation, your operator's procedures or the regulations themselves.