So, Dan and Jason embarked on multiple adventures, capturing fun and exciting content for you all to enjoy. Let’s take a moment to recap some of the videos we’ve created so far.

Boeing 737-8 MAX Jumpseat Flight

This video was one of our favorite ones to film. We collaborated with Norwegian Air Shuttle to film some content, and a part of that collaboration included a jumpseat flight into the Arctic Circle. If you’ve ever wondered what it’s like inside a MAX cockpit during flight, this is the video for you.

Emirates A350 Inaugural Flight

Join us onboard Emirates' brand-new Airbus A350-900 (A6-EXA) for its inaugural flight from Dubai to Edinburgh on EK23! Seated in 16K, Premium Economy, we capture this exciting milestone for Emirates, showcasing the sleek design, enhanced cabin experience, and all the highlights of this iconic moment in aviation!

Cargo A340-600 Behind-the-Scenes

These days, the A340 is considered rare, as many airlines have retired or are in the process of retiring it in favor of newer, more efficient aircraft. European Cargo, an air freight company, decided that these aircraft deserved a second life as cargo planes and we went behind the scenes to capture their unique operation.

The Electric Passenger Plane

Heart Aerospace, a Swedish company dedicated to reducing carbon emissions in aviation, invited us to their headquarters near Gothenburg. We got an exclusive look at their cutting-edge Heart X1 demonstrator and their ES-30 flight simulator. We even had the chance to chat with their CTO, Benjamin Stabler. Their mission to revolutionize sustainable aviation is nothing short of inspiring!

Norwegian Hangar + Ops Tour

Ever wondered what happens behind the scenes at an airline? We got exclusive access to Norwegian Air Shuttle’s hangar at OSL, where we took an in-depth look at one of their 737-800s and explored fascinating topics like GPS jamming and spoofing. The experience didn’t stop there—we also toured their operations department at their headquarters for a deeper dive into how this airline keeps things running smoothly!

KLM A321neo Inaugural Flight

Any flight can be exciting for aviation enthusiasts, but what’s more thrilling than a regular flight? Inaugural flights; the unforgettable moment when an airline operates its very first passenger flight with a brand-new aircraft. We had the privilege of flying on KLM’s inaugural A321neo journey from Amsterdam to Copenhagen, capturing the entire experience, including exclusive ramp access in Copenhagen.

If you’re looking to catch up on all of our real-world aviation content, head over to our dedicated real-world aviation playlist and dive into all the exciting adventures we’ve shared so far.

What’s next?

More content, of course! We’re actively working on new videos to share with you all. Do you work in the aviation industry or have access to unique areas that could make for incredible behind-the-scenes content? We’d love to hear from you! Our mission is to share exclusive insights into the world of aviation, and with your help, we can continue to bring our community closer to the action. Whether it’s a hangar tour, flight deck access, or a glimpse into day-to-day operations, let’s collaborate. Reach out to us, and let’s make something happen!

Infinite Flight is more than just a flight simulator—we’re a thriving, passionate community united by a shared love for aviation. While our developers are hard at work coding new features to make Infinite Flight even better, our community team focuses on bringing you new and exciting experiences that strengthen our bond as a global aviation family. Your support is what makes it all possible!

Don’t forget to like, subscribe, and turn on notifications so you’re the first to catch our next upload. Thanks for being part of this journey—see you in the next one! ✈️

Subscribe to our YouTube channel

Existing hand-held gamepad controllers work with flight simulators. Sort of. You can map controls to your liking in most major flight simulators, but you have to make compromises. The rudder is a prime example of this since they are mechanically linked in the aircraft. The Arrow has solved this by adding mechanically linked triggers. Not only that but they've taken a general aviation approach to their design and borrowed from the trim wheel and vernier-style controls for things like throttle and mixture, or even reverse thrust on an airliner.

What started with co-founder Thomas Nield etching circuit boards with pool-cleaning acid in his garage (as we all have), quickly became a viable product garnering lots of excitement in the flight sim industry.

Infinite Flight has been an amazing canvas on which to paint. The multi-press capability designed into the app and the huge variety of possible assignments have spurred our imagination on how to marry these two together... Your support and encouragement of Yawman have gotten us here.

Early in 2023, we had the opportunity to meet up with the Yawman Arrow founders with our friend Steve Thorne from Flight Chops. The ride from Ontario, Canada down to I69 Clermont County in Ohio was less than straightforward and it's all captured—along with our chat with Yawman—in a Flight Chops video.

The Yawman Arrow works with Infinite Flight for Android right out of the box, since Android devices accommodate USB-C external devices. An iPad simulator with a controller is a higher mountain to climb due to the way Apple handles its connected device policies. For the technologically inclined reader, there are a few ways to successfully connect your iOS device to the Yawman Arrow; one of which was created by Infinite Flight CEO Laura Laban, and is outlined in a GitHub repo for your convenience.

GitHub - mlaban/if-joystick: A program to connect to Infinite Flight via Infinite Flight Connect API v2 and send joystick/keyboard inputs.

A program to connect to Infinite Flight via Infinite Flight Connect API v2 and send joystick/keyboard inputs. - GitHub - mlaban/if-joystick: A program to connect to Infinite Flight via Infinite Fli...

GitHubmlaban

Yawman Arrow deep dive with Jon Ostrower and Thomas Nield

We caught up with co-founders, Jon and Thomas to go deeper and talk about how the Arrow came to be, and what might come next for Yawman.  

A Canadian wrote this article. Is the name of your controller a nod to the Canadian interceptor that never was?

Great question and let’s pour one out for a great-looking plane. The name Arrow is really a play off of Yawman, which itself is a play off of Yeoman – an archer. The Arrow hits the target and can be aimed with incredible precision and flies through the air. It just felt right.

What was the main inspiration behind bringing flight sim controls to a hand-held?

I [Yawman Co-Founder Thomas Nield] first came up with the idea for the handheld controller when I jumped back into flight simulation in 2020, primarily to familiarize myself with different avionics systems, as well as just missing the hobby! However, I have always liked not being confined to my desk. I wanted to sim while at a hotel/airport or a coffee shop, or at home just being near my family and not away from everyone. I tried conventional handheld controllers and then found myself making a wish list of controls that needed to be added. When I thought of our Vernier-style poles (like a C172) on top of mechanically-linked triggers for yaw control, sliders, and a trim wheel... I finally leaned into the idea and built a prototype. Everything just kind of snowballed from there.

What was the biggest design challenge and how did you overcome it?

When I first made the prototype, I literally was etching circuit boards with pool-cleaning acid in my garage and 3D printing different designs. In a matter of months, I had prototypes that proved the concept worked. However, that was the easy part. Designing for manufacturing is an entirely different animal, and that is where we learned the most about bringing a product to market. We did most of our design work during the pandemic and we watched supply chains collapsing all over the world. We decided early on to build in the USA in Kentucky, but the prototype I built and hand-soldered was not streamlined for manufacturing. Having a great idea is one thing, actually making sure you can get it to market reliably is another.

Getting through the manufacturing development phase was an extended challenge. Getting a complex organic shape out of a mold and making sure the resin moves evenly was a real learning experience. There’s so much science here, but it really is an art form. We worked with some really excellent design engineers to make it all possible.

How does the Arrow improve flight simulation?

It’s rare that you get an opportunity to bring something totally different to market. People’s frame of reference is a gaming controller with standard and highly constrained features. When you take expensive yokes, throttles, and rudder pedals that take up both space and setup time and give that back to simmers, we find that we’ve exponentially increased the opportunity to fly.

We discovered that immersion isn’t solely the idea of feeling like you’re using hardware that precisely resembles that of a real airplane, it’s the idea of keeping your hands off of a mouse and keyboard. We’re extending the idea of immersion to a handheld that gives you a full cockpit close at hand.

We’ve heard from folks who are planning to make big hardware purchases because the Arrow now exists: laptops or tablets to fly when they travel or are out of the house or desktops to fly in VR without fumbling to find buttons on big hardware or just want to grab 15 minutes in the pattern before dinner or just don’t want their sim to take over their desk. We’re not competing with hardware that’s already out there, we’re growing the pie and welcoming a whole new segment of the community that wants minimal, portable, and highly capable flight controls.

How did using Infinite Flight help with the development of the Arrow?

We knew that once we had the ability to bring an all-in-one yoke, throttle, and rudder pedals to a tablet, we could unlock a whole new world for simming that wasn’t possible before. Infinite Flight has been an amazing canvas on which to paint. The multi-press capability designed into the app and the huge variety of possible assignments have spurred our imagination on how to marry these two together. It’s not just hand flying, you have full engine, autopilot, and ATC controls available as well. It’s also really fun to fly while flying.

On a personal level, Infinite Flight was instrumental in helping show the great team at Sporty’s Pilot Shop that we were ready, not just for the sim community, but the pilot community that is just as passionate about its hardware. We couldn’t have done it – or at least it would have been a heck of a lot harder –  without the Infinite Flight team. Your support and encouragement of Yawman have gotten us here. This amazing community is what makes all of this possible.

Are you planning multiple SKUs at Yawman or will you stick to one product?

Creating the Arrow was one huge challenge, setting up the manufacturing operation in the U.S. to build it was the other. Getting the manufacturing operation rolling smoothly means sticking to  one SKU for the time being and minimizing the complexity of our assembly process. For now.

Are you already thinking about v2 for the arrow, and if so, what's next?

We don’t plan on being a one product company and we’re in this for the long haul, but right now our focus is getting the Arrow into people’s hands.

Buy the Yawman Arrow

The Arrow is available for USD$199 from Sporty's Pilot Shop and direct to consumers on the Yawman website.

The best way to make your voice heard on a regular basis is to vote for features on our community forum in the #features category. While top votes don't always line up with our top priorities and long-term vision as a company, they do play a huge part in helping determine what our core users are thinking. Today, we've taken the top 5 heavy commercial aircraft as voted by our community, adding them to a poll.

Over the course of time, forum users will come and go, and some feature request topics have been open for quite a long time. Opening the selection up to a new vote ensures we know what the users of today want.

2-Round Voting System

With so many aircraft to choose from, a single vote may not necessarily represent the overall will of the people. For that reason, this year's aircraft development poll will be a 2-round system. If the winning aircraft receives the majority vote in round 1, the poll is over. If there's no clear majority after the first vote, we will open a second poll with the top two winners from the first poll.

Factors for development

Of course, many factors contribute to development decisions at Infinite Flight. Company goals, industry demands, user patterns and feedback, and other factors go into every development decision to help make our flight simulator the best it can be. That said, we’ll continue to use the community poll method laid out in our 2021/22 Development Roadmap, where feasible. This includes presenting the top feature requests for a particular aircraft category (military cargo, commercial heavy airliner, GA turboprop, etc)  for a community vote to decide what enters the development pipeline!

Vote for the next aircraft!

Ready to cast your vote for Infinite Flight's next aircraft? Based on the top 5 community forum feature requests for heavy commercial aircraft as of the date of this article being published, we have set up a poll where you can cast your vote. Here are your candidates:

• A380
• B747-400
• B767-300ER
• B787-9
• A340-300

Voting is now close and the A380 has won!

Battle Of The Heavies - WINNER!

We have a winner! In a well-fought race between our top 5 community-voted heavy airliners, the A380 has emerged victorious. Using a 2-round voting system to determine the majority, the B767-300ER and A380 came out as the top 2 contenders. We then asked YOU which of these two deserved a place in the…

Infinite Flight Communityjasonrosewell

Things to know:

• Work on the winning aircraft will start when our 3D artists are done with the E190 and Challenger 350 models
• If, for reasons beyond our control Infinite Flight staff cannot complete the winning aircraft in a timely manner, we may switch it out at our discretion as a last resort
• Poll results will be concealed until a later date so voters are not swayed when viewing voting trends
• Round 1 will run from 9 Nov 2022 at 1700Z until 11 Nov 2022 at 1700Z
• Based on the results of Round 1, and if there isn't a clear majority winner, Round 2 will run from 11 Nov 2022 until 13 Nov 2022 at 1700Z.

There are many places to connect with other Infinite Flight users that include our official community forum, social media, and various Slack workspaces and Discord servers. After much consideration, our community team has put together the official Infinite Flight Discord server, which will be accessible to any user with an active subscription to Infinite Flight Pro.

What are the perks of the Infinite Flight Discord server?

• Exclusive feature sneak peeks
• More interaction with developers
• Influence Infinite Flight direction with subscriber-only polls

There's no doubt that Pro subscribers feel a sense of ownership and community within the Infinite Flight ecosystem. Your contributions are crucial to app development and your voices matter. An official Discord server allows us to have you all in one place for extra news, polls, and interactions.

Join Infinite Flight on Discord

We've made joining our new Discord server easy! Simply open Infinite Flight on your device and use the settings cog to navigate to the settings area. Choose the account tab on the left side of the screen, and select Connect beside Discord Account, then follow the prompts to join the server.

Please note that as we are rolling this out gradually you may not see this option right away. Additionally, this option will only be available for users with an active subscription to Infinite Flight Pro.

FAQ

Should I use Discord or the forum?
The community forum will still be the place for all users to post and find events, follow along with development news, receive support, and see moderator and staff commentary. Discord will be the place for real-time conversations, group flights with other Pro subscribers, access to members-only perks, and much more.

Why is this for Pro subscribers?
We are proud to offer Infinite Flight for free on the App Store and on Google Play. This gives all users a chance to use the simulator and get a feel for most features without paying a cent. We wanted to give our Pro subscribers an extra perk as our way of saying thank you for the support. This will help us keep advancing our technology and features, and will keep our server professional and ad-free.

Why can't I see the Discord connect option?
If you have an active subscription to Infinite Flight Pro and you're reading this at the time of publishing, it's likely we haven't rolled it out to your device yet. We don't want to overwhelm our moderators so we're rolling out gradually. If you still think you should see the option to connect and you just subscribed to Infinite Flight Pro, please try restarting the app.

Why can't I see any channels after joining the server?
After linking your account you may have to wait several minutes to see all of the channels. We're still training our robots.

Can I join without a subscription?
To join the server without a subscription, you can visit discord.gg/infiniteflight for a read-only view of our announcement and rules channels.

What if I still need help?
If you're new to Discord, they have a beginner's guide that will help you immensely. If you need technical support with connecting from your Infinite Flight settings account, please use our community forum support category.

Support

This is where you should ask questions about any issue you are having with Infinite Flight. Please read the following before opening a support topic so we can help you best.

Infinite Flight Community

See you on Discord ;)

How it started

In October of 2014, the first Friday Night Flight was hosted on our East USA server, with an 85 aircraft cap. The destination was KJFK in the New York Region two months after the launch of Infinite Flight Live; the first iteration of multiplayer flight. The vibe was electric. Pilots from around the world joined in to take part in group flights on their mobile devices. This was the start of something exciting.

Where we're headed

The saying goes, all good things must come to an end. And so it is for FNF. Communities and individuals from around the world have used this event as a meeting place and a way to unwind after a long week. In 2021, we added live streams of our FNF with giveaways and guests to add to the fun!

But we're ready for a change. As we've said many times, our community is the heartbeat of Infinite Flight. One needn't look any further than the Infinite Flight Community Forum's #events category to see the passion and creativity that already exists among users.

Moving forward, our team will be incorporating your events into our official communications and live stream schedules! Like all things Infinite Flight, we plan to iterate and evolve as we follow the community’s lead. We're excited about this new direction for our official events where we can showcase your creativity and hard work in planning events for friends, virtual airlines, and virtual organizations.

We encourage everyone to keep an eye out on our community forum's events category for more details in the coming weeks and months as we make this transition. In the meantime, we hope you'll join us for our Friday Night Flight Grand Finale this week! Blue skies, and tailwinds. ✈

Creating a great live stream isn't a trivial thing. Production quality, a charismatic host, and a lot of time and passion are key ingredients when streaming.  Enter @AviatorDan. Dan Woodhams popped up on our radar while building his YouTube channel, streaming mostly Infinite Flight and MSFS2020 to his growing audience.

At Infinite Flight we're always looking for passionate self-starters who have a genuine desire to see our simulator grow. This is why we're excited to welcome Dan as an official member of the Infinite Flight team as our official live streamer!

Dan lives in South East UK and has extensive experience in the hospitality industry as a qualified Flight Attendant. He's currently working on his PPL (though recently halted due to COVID-19) and aspires to work his way toward a pilot career with EasyJet. Dan has been an Infinite Flight user since before the days of multiplayer flight and has continued to share in our passion for mobile flight simulation. He also has a Cockapoo named Teddy.

Watch for Dan on our official live streams on Twitch! This is the best place to win free Infinite Flight prizes, see sneak development peeks, and more. Throw us a follow so you don't miss out!

Welcome aboard, Dan! Here's to may great live streams ahead.

Building Infinite Flight’s ATC Schedule

Now it’s time to build! The schedule’s map is built using mapchart.net, while the airports and schedule information is put into a staged forum topic. I always create the schedule with the last few week’s schedules open in a separate tab. This allows me to ensure the regions I plan to choose for the upcoming week are not repetitive or featured on the same days. While I try to feature the US and Europe on each schedule due to these being our audience’s primary locations, I’ll still try to work in a region, theme, or airline that steers ATC to unique areas. The scheduling frequency of underserved areas is based entirely on engagement! I encourage you to challenge yourself to fly in and out of airports you wouldn’t normally choose when they’re staffed.

Once a region of the world and airline is chosen for a specific day I begin checking to see how many available aircraft can be flown on Infinite Flight with that particular carrier. Carriers represented on more than one aircraft or variant often generate more traffic and opportunity for unique destinations. For example, choosing to highlight Germany and Lufthansa opens up routes for anything from the CRJ to an A350! The airport possibilities are endless and the goal is to provide plenty of short, medium, and long haul opportunities.

How do I choose which airports are featured? I use a mix of FlightRadar24, IFC Route Databases, and Wikipedia to determine suitable airports serviced by that airline. The most used resource is Wikipedia which offers a full list of airlines and their destinations for any airport in the world. This information allows me to select unique airport pairings to regularly introduce new routes. Another key factor when choosing airports is their geographic relation to the most popular airport, or HUB, for that day.

For each day of the schedule I’ll typically select about 8 airports which will offer options for Infinite Flight Air Traffic Controllers (IFATC) while also leaving some freedom if they’re all staffed on a busier day. IFATC has also expressed a great appreciation for days where they can choose their own airports. I will regularly schedule ATC choice themed days in various regions of the world. Not only is this fun for the IFATC team but it also provides us with great data to see what our community wants most when presented with a day to call all of the shots! Lastly: schedule review!

Once the schedule has been created I will review all airports to ensure they have been edited in the sim and contain things like ground markings, and parking locations. I also check to make sure they have ATC frequencies, and have the correct ICAO identification on the schedule. You can always find the latest schedule pinned on the Community Forum each Sunday!

What is ‘General Aviation Day by Infinite Flight’?
General Aviation day by Infinite Flight, GA Day for short, is our new bimonthly general aviation (GA) event. Designed to give GA the spotlight across the Infinite Flight community, the event will be hosted at small GA airports, located within relatively close proximity to one another. These airports will change for each event, and the series will explore all corners of the planet where GA flying is possible.

How can I participate in General Aviation Day by Infinite Flight?
These events will be flown on our online servers, so Infinite Flight Pro is needed to enjoy the experience. For non-Pro users, we highly encourage flying GA where possible and enjoying the spirit of GA with Infinite Flight in your own time.

Each event will last a full 24 hours, starting at 0600Z on the day of the event, and ending at 0600Z the following day. During this time, controllers will be active at event airports. For our Expert Server users, ATC will be mandated to control at these airports. For our Training Server users, we suggest getting into the theme of the event and opening and flying at these airports too, however this will not be mandated. You will be able to find the event airports, and all the further details, on our community forum.

Do I have to already know how to fly general aviation aircraft to join the event?
Absolutely not! This event is designed to be a platform for our educational content from the User Guide and YouTube channel to be put into practice. We want to encourage GA flying by pilots, from the novice first time user, to the experienced real-world private pilot!

5 Tutorials To Watch For Infinite Flight Beginners

Flying a flight simulator on a mobile device can be a complex thing to do. In this article, we will show you our top 5 tutorials that will get you flying like the professionals!

Infinite FlightMisha Camp

What is your goal for this event series?
Our aim is to make GA Day a dynamic and educational aspect of our event portfolio. We’ll slowly introduce more components into the event as time goes on and our pilot community continues to learn and grow. In the future you can expect events to feature VOR navigation, advanced types of VFR flying, IFR practice, and more! Don’t worry if this all sounds confusing right now as you will always be able to take part no matter your experience level.

Will I be able to fly commercial and military aircraft online during these events?
Yes, you will still be permitted to fly these aircraft online during this event. However, at event airports, aircraft restrictions will be in place. These restrictions will only allow for general aviation aircraft (with limited per-event exemptions) to be permitted at event airports during the event period. These airports will be marked with large, red temporary flight restrictions (TFRs) on the map, and a pop up will show when spawning. These TFRs will have key event information including the list of permitted aircraft. Please be aware that these TFRs are on the Expert Server only and will be enforced by our trained ATC.

So, what are you waiting for?

Our first GA Day event will be underway soon, and it’s not too late to get some practice ahead of time! Head to your App Store or Google Play Store to download Infinite Flight, and we will see you in the skies!

The best way to make your voice heard on a regular basis is to vote for features on our community forum in the #features category. While top votes don't always line up with our top priorities and long term vision as a company, they do play a huge part in helping determine what our core users are thinking. Today, we've taken the top 10 aircraft as voted by our community and we're adding them to a poll.

Over the course of time, forum users will come and go, and some feature request topics have been open for quite a long time. This allows those requests to collect more votes than what may be represented in our current demographic.

2-Round Voting System

With so many aircraft to choose from, a single vote may not necessarily represent the overall will of the people. For that reason, this year's aircraft development poll will be a 2-round system. If the winning aircraft receives the majority vote, then the poll is over. If there's no clear majority after the first vote, we will open a second poll with the top two winners from the first poll.

Factors for development

Of course many factors contribute to development decisions at Infinite Flight. Company goals, industry demands, user patterns and feedback, and other factors go into every development decision to help make our flight simulator the best it can be.

Vote for the next aircraft! ?

Ready to cast your vote for Infinite Flight's next aircraft? Based on the top 10 community forum feature requests as of the date of this article being published, we have set up a poll where you can cast your vote. Round one is open now, includes new aircraft and reworks, and includes a staff pick for rework as well.

Things to know:

• If, for reasons beyond our control Infinite Flight staff cannot complete the winning aircraft in a timely manner, we may switch it out at our discretion as a last resort
• Poll results will be concealed until a later date so voters are not swayed when viewing voting trends
• Round 1 will run from Saturday, 14 November 2020 until Tuesday, 17 November 2020
• Based on the results of Round 1, and if there isn't a clear majority winner, Round 2 will run from Tuesday, 17 November 2020 until Friday, 20 November 2020

Round 1 Results

The results for round 1 are in! To see all of the discussion, head to our community forum.

Ready to vote on Round 2? Head to our community forum now!

Vote for Infinite Flight’s Next Aircraft - Round 2

This year we have implemented a 2-round voting system so the community can help decide Infinite Flight’s next aircraft build! Due to the fact that the votes in the features category all have different lifespans, and since users who voted will come and go, the 2-round system allows us to take the top…

Infinite Flight Communityjasonrosewell

First, let’s highlight a few of the places that this article will cover. These are the hubs of community interaction for Infinite Flight users. There may be a few requirements to be able to participate in them, but we will highlight these for you! In no particular order, these are the best places to engage with the Infinite Flight community:

1. The Official Infinite Flight Forum
2. Virtual Airlines and Organizations
3. Infinite Flight ATC
4. Infinite Flight’s Social Media
5. Airport Editing

Within these spaces, you can interact with the community in various ways. These can be big or small, and we encourage you to try as many things as you can. In every place, you will find a vibrant and welcoming group of people who are ready to help you with whatever you may need. You will also find our staff and moderators active in many of these spaces too!

So, what are the best ways we think you can engage with the global Infinite Community?

Make or participate in events and group flights

A large part of our online community is dedicated to creating and participating in events and group flights. In 2019 alone we had over 1,100 community events, plus many more group flights! These were made by community members, staff, or other community groups.

To make or participate in these, our community forum is the place to go. On the forum, we have individual categories for events and group flights. For events, look for the #events category, and for group flights look for #GroupFlights. You can find these in the list of categories that pop up once the hamburger menu in the top right of the page is selected. This is the icon next to your profile photo.

To make an event you need to have spent a little time on our forum and have risen to Trust Level 2. More on Trust Levels here. All members, however, can post group flights. These are categorized differently from events. Find what counts as a group flight.

The easiest way to take part in these is simply to turn up and fly! Some events require gate assignments, however for the majority you can just hop in the assigned aircraft and fly the event with others. We suggest letting the organizers know you are attending by commenting on the event. Event numbers can range from a handful of attendees to upwards of 150, so there will be something for everyone! For our in-house events such as the Friday Night Flight (FNF) or Whacky Racing, you can simply turn up and fly without having the hassle of organizing anything yourself! The FNF is posted weekly on Thursday afternoon Zulu time. You can find all the information each week on the forum event topic.

Start, or be part of, a VA or VO

A VA is a virtual airline. A VO is a virtual organization. There are a few differences between them. A VA is an airline-based organization where you can fly real routes, operate codeshare flights, and climb up rankings of pilot seniority. A VO leans more towards creativity and more relaxed virtual experiences. This can include general aviation groups, airshow groups, or military organizations.

We have a voluntary board who oversee the management of these groups. They are the Infinite Flight Virtual Airline Regulatory Board, more commonly known as the IFVARB. To make a VA/VO, you must go through the application process set out by them. This can be detailed and extensive as we want to ensure the best possible experience for our users. The IFVARB is overseen by staff and all significant decisions are guided by them. If you have a great idea for a new VA or VO, check out the first steps to applying.

Whilst there are many volunteer staff positions in these community groups, most users enjoy participating in a more relaxed way, either simply as a pilot or attendee to VA events. We have a huge array of organizations for you to choose from, so if you are wanting to find one for you, head the list of active VA/VOs to find the one. Many VAs/VOs have requirements to join, the most common being age and server grade. You will find the specifics for each VA/VO either on their website or forum topic.

As is the case for group flights, you can find more information about this on our community forum, or by heading to the IFVARB website. You can also find a list of active VA/VOs on this website, how to apply as a pilot, and how to reserve a VA/VO.

Train to be an expert server ATC

Air traffic control is one of the fundamental aspects that make up the Infinite Flight experience. Whilst most users stick to flying, a small number of key users make the transition to becoming trained air traffic controllers alongside being a pilot. We call this group of users IFATC, which stands for Infinite Flight Air Traffic Controllers. These controllers have passed both a written and a practical exam, and have earned the privilege of controlling on the expert server.

To learn more about this, and potentially go on to apply, head to the community forum. You can find the requirements for becoming IFATC here. Part of being in IFATC is activity, so if you are only interested in controlling in an ad-hoc manner, we’d urge you to consider how much time you can put into controlling. Currently, the requirement is activity in 6 months before you have to redo both the practical and theory test.

If that sounds too much, don’t worry! You can still control on the training server at any time. Here you can develop your skills and learn more about how to be an effective air traffic controller. There are several community groups dedicated to helping you with this alongside with the Infinite Flight YouTube and forum tutorials.

Share and promote Infinite Flight on social media

Social media is important to us. It is one of the places that we share new information and news first, and you can find work in progress information there exclusively. You can find out social media handles below:

Many in the community engage with us on social media. They share our news, help answer questions, and go on to set up their own Infinite Flight related accounts. Many of our current beta testers and leading community members started off by setting up accounts to post their own Infinite Flight content. We frequently repost community content, so this is a great way to start getting noticed by us and the wider community! The fantastic thing about social media is that there are no restrictions to participate.

What we love to see is people helping out in all aspects of our community. Our leading members can be found on the forum, in VA/VOs, and on social media. This helps us spread our message and create community ties. We love seeing friendships being made, opinions shared, and a love of Infinite Flight being promoted!

Build cool third party apps using our APIs

Infinite Flight offers a local API to control all aspects of the sim - the Connect API - and the Live API to get data about flights currently flying on our multiplayer servers. We’ve seen people build flight trackers, voice-announcement addons, and remote controls, but there are so many opportunities that the APIs provide. Check out the Live API and sample code for the Connect API. Our Third Party forum category is the place to find addons and interact with the third party developer community.

Help create airports for the simulator

Last, but certainly not least, is the opportunity to volunteer as an airport editor with us. We have a large group of people who edit these behind the scenes. If you are not someone who is as active in the front-facing communities of Infinite Flight, or perhaps you want a more technical challenge, this could be a great opportunity for you.

To apply to this group, termed IFAET (Infinite Flight Airport Editing Team), head to the Infinite Flight community and send a message to @airportediting. Before applying, we suggest you check out the beginner’s guide. This will give you a good understanding of the techniques involved in airport creation. You will also need to download software and have an understanding of GitHub to participate in IFAET.

If this all sounds too much, but you still want to give it a go, other IFAET members will be there every step of the way to assist you. We love to see people trying new things, so don’t be afraid to get stuck in and learn as you go!

We’ve covered a few of the best ways that you can engage with our worldwide community, however, there are many more paths you can take. If you have any tips or guidance for others, please share it below. We’d love to see it!

Read our official announcement about COVID-19 and its impact on Infinite Flight users and events.

2019 was a good one

Infinite Flight 2020 Events

We will update this section as things evolve in our planning. Here's what's coming up this year for Infinite Flight!

FlightSimExpo 2020 - CANCELED

Where: Tropicana Las Vegas, NV, USA
When: June 12-14, 2020
Website & Tickets: flightsimexpo.com

AirVenture 2020 - CANCELED

Where: Oshkosh, WI, USA
When: July 20-26, 2020
Website: eaa.org/airventure

Long-time community member and Infinite Flight user, Asher Z. from Los Angeles, California has taken his passion for aviation to the skies with his PPL training. We asked Asher how Infinite Flight has helped him on this journey.

I fly a Czech Sport Cruiser and C172 out of KSMO. After practicing using Infinite Flight's reworked 172, my instructor saw a huge improvement not only with my flying, but my understanding of the effects of the control inputs. I was much faster with what to do in the cockpit with startup, glancing at instruments, and simply knowing where everything was. Infinite Flight has given me the fuel to continue my passion of aviation from a young age. I hope to dedicate some more 172 stick time in Infinite Flight so I can improve my flying from the ground and apply it when I’m in the moment. I would suggest any student pilot to try it as well!

Asher has been to several real-world aviation events to hang out with the Infinite Flight crew, including EAA's AirVenture in Oshkosh, Wisconsin. He took advantage of EAA's Young Eagles program, further fuelling his drive to become a pilot.

While some pilots like Asher knew very early on that flying was in their future, some Infinite Flight users didn't realize this could actually be a career possibility for them until they picked up their device and started flying. Forum user, JM shared his story:

Being a pilot had always been a thought in the back of my head until I came across Infinite Flight which really made me believe that I could become a pilot. Because of Infinite Flight I have actually begun my pilot training locally flying GA aircraft, and have planned out my whole career!

When real world skills meet Infinite Flight

Sometimes, the reverse can be true and a user's real-world aviation experience can give them a new-found appreciation for our mobile simulator. For user Maksim Ferguson, this was the case. Maksim is currently the youngest Brit to fly solo.

I have been playing Infinite Flight since before the days of multiplayer. I always loved it and thought it was a great tool for learning the basics of flying, and to experiment with how an aircraft reacts to different inputs. Now, Infinite Flight has changed so much since those days, producing realistic virtual cockpits with moving gauges. This has allowed me to bring my [real-world aviation] experience into the simulator, and with the working G1000 models in some of the aircraft, this allows me to stay mentally current and up to date with the workings of the Avionics System. I would definitely say that IF has been a key aspect in my RWA training, and definitely played a crucial role in further encouraging me to become an aviation enthusiast. It has supported me substantially in my recent achievements, especially this wonderful community.

When Infinite Flight enhances commercial flying

Sometimes the love of aviation extends beyond the flight deck and a pilot's off-time includes sitting down with their favorite simulator. This is the case for Matt (or as the Infinite Flight Community knows him, @deercrusher).

Infinite Flight has been a tremendous help to me in my professional career by allowing me to continue to stay current and proficient with the necessary callouts and flight profiles that we would use on a daily basis. Without this there would be holes in my performance which in turn could hinder our number one goal: safety.

I see what Infinite Flight has done, as a “continued education” platform that I can use today. I’ve been approached by folks who ask, “why do you still fly a mobile flight sim even though you’re qualified to fly real planes?” To me the answer is simple; it's fun! Real world weather, winds aloft, accurate aircraft physics, fuel burn data relevant to the specific aircraft being flown, and global scenery are some of the key components that matter to me the most. With those five ingredients, you have the makings of a realistic simulator capable of supporting all age groups covering a vast of experience levels; from novice to professional.

I enjoy aviation with a passion so great that I simply can’t get away from it. Even if it means in my free time that I’m using the same callouts, procedures, flight profiles, and checklists, I still enjoy what it is that I do. The added benefit is that I am current and proficient in those items when it comes time to go fly passengers from point A to point B in the real world.

It's the little things that others have made for our enjoyment that have the biggest impact on what it is we do in our daily lives outside of this amazing app.

Another former Infinite Flight moderator and IFATC member, Aernout is an Airbus pilot with time as a first officer in the A380. He has used the app extensively to feed his passion for flying in his down time.

Infinite Flight was something I never expected. I got involved just when the beta for multiplayer got released, I honestly can’t remember how many years ago that was but time is really flying, and as a real life pilot I was truly amazed with all the people I came in touch with sharing a single passion.  Infinite Flight really made me look forward for my layovers to relax and unwind with an amazing group of people involved. Everybody being so open minded and getting in touch with other pilots from all over the world has made this a part of my life I would never forget. I have made friendships with people which I hope will last forever.

Gliding into the practice area

Infinite Flight ATC supervisor and trainer, Tom Hogrefe is a licensed glider pilot. For Tom, Infinite Flight is the perfect way to practice and fill that aviation void in the off-season!

Flying gliders is a seasonal activity, with a lot of flying taking place in the spring and summer months when weather is better for us. I discovered Infinite Flight a few years back and initially used it as a fun way to scratch the flying itch either during the winter or while I was away at school.

The introduction of global flight allowed me to practice flying into an accurate version of my home gliderport and check out landmarks around there, helping me stay sharp and practice approaches - starting low, flying a pattern on the opposite side from normal, even off-field landings! All things that would take a lot longer in real life, I can run through multiple times in quick succession with real-world landmarks, systems, and physics.

The recent C172 rework has taken things a step further, simulating many of the subsystems in the aircraft. I’m not a power pilot, but I imagine knowing how these systems operate and interact will give me a leg up once I get a chance to start training. For now, it’s a great way to prepare and stay sharp.

Some users have plans other than flying

For some, flying isn't even the goal. We had the pleasure of meeting Isaac at FlightSimExpo in Orlando, Florida in 2019. His dream is to work in airline management and his sights are set straight at the top. He reached out and began by saying he thought his story was dull. We disagree enough to share it here as inspiration for others.

What I want to do is work for an airline. I would prefer to work in fleet management or route networking, as I find those very fascinating, but also then I don’t have to land a 200+ ton airliner in hurricane conditions, with no visibility, all while being responsible for 250 pax in the back! My ultimate goal is to run an airline one day, but I need to take one bite at a time if I'm to somehow get there.

What Infinite Flight has helped me with is really the general knowledge aspects of aviation. The community has helped more than anything. All of these professionals and amateurs alike with their extensive erudition of the wonderful world of aviation was a dream for me. I have lived basically my entire life with my head pointed towards the sky, so I’m always looking for something to quench my thirst.

Simply put, Infinite Flight is perfect for that! Not only is it a cost-friendly option, as I can play on my own device, but I can log onto the [Infinite Flight Community forum] to learn something new, or help others who are just beginning their journey! Or, I can fly to practice my skills using realistic physics, or even try famous and difficult approaches from around the world that I wouldn’t be able to do in real life.

Whatever your journey, we hope Infinite Flight can be a part of it. We'd love to hear about yours, either on our community forum, or in your raving app store review! In the mean time, we'll continue on our quest to bring aviation to users no matter where they are.

What is ‘Community Management’ at Infinite Flight?

Community management is a term you will hear constantly thrown around. It is easy to pass off as a term with little meaning, used primarily as an umbrella term for all community-wide discussion, engagement, and communication. To an extent, community management does indeed encompass that. However, here at Infinite Flight, we like to elevate the meaning a little higher than a generic buzzword; community management is important and a vital tool for building a successful company.

At Infinite Flight, we focus on two key components of community management. First and foremost we promote engagement between users, not just between the company and the community. For our global community, this is key.

Our community forum is a pinnacle of this, and we have focused on this to enable intra-community engagement. On social media, you will regularly see us nudging people towards the forum for answers to their queries, amongst other reasons. This isn’t due to laziness in our social media team [we promise], but is instead a catalyst for peer to peer interaction. When we get users to the forums, the gravity of the community discussion is a strong factor in keeping them there. This is both a benefit to us since dialogue between the company and the community can be more direct, which further enhances the user experience. From our users’ perspective, having a host of other users to interact with makes the experience more enjoyable. From there, the community creates its own links, and the huge balloon of virtual airlines, virtual organizations, and real-world friendships that have come from this are a testament to the power of user-to-user communication.

However, community management is not just getting users to talk to one another. To be successful, it also has to guide and set frameworks for discussion to take place. Guiding discussions can be done in various ways. Simply reacting positively to negativity is one such example, with another being a set of rules found on the forum. On social media, you may even see us reacting with emojis to certain comments. This is us trying to nudge the direction of the discourse and setting indirect examples of what is acceptable or not. A prevalent example many of our users may know is the high number of female pilots found in the cockpits of our aircraft. By setting the framework to create a positive discussion based on the lack of female pilots in the industry, we get the community talking.

Why we engage our community

Many brands and companies have a poor digital footprint. It is almost a certainty that those companies are harder to engage with, poorer at communication, and their user base is a fraction of the potential it could be. Pursuing a greater level of these key community components is the first and foremost reason for us to invest in community management.

Furthermore, our product is an intangible one; you cannot touch or feel our product like a food or furniture item. In the event of the product malfunctioning, a user cannot visually see what is wrong with it. This means finding a solution may seem harder to attain than with a tangible product. Providing online support is therefore key to us at Infinite Flight. The ability for users to get a quick and clear response from us is something we pride ourselves on. This is no longer a bonus feature, but now is a key component for any successful company who operates online.

When community management is most vital

Specific to us as a company is the factor of crisis management. Our product is ever-changing and constantly being updated and adapted. With this comes a higher capacity for either human error or device malfunctions. With each update, this risk is at its highest, as any underlying issues will arise quickly. During this time our team is on high alert for issues, and the effort and time spent investing in community management shines.

One recent example of this was our 19.1 release earlier this year. This brought many amazing features such as live replay, with the Airbus A330 family also getting a host of new features. Upon release, an issue with the A333 was found by our users. This issue was due to the feature that enables aircraft downloads being completely reworked behind the scenes. During this time, the aircraft configuration files were mismatched between what it thought the aircraft should be and what the aircraft actually was. This issue was widespread, and many of our users experienced it.

Throughout this time community management and support were shining. Setting a clear and obvious channel of communication on our forum and social media, we kept users in the loop with the latest information of a ‘hotfix’. It is worth noting here that a hotfix is a very normal phenomenon in software development. Throughout this process, our community was spreading this information between one another. Now, remembering that community management is encouraging user-to-user interactions, this was a clear example of the power of community management. Within minutes of the issue being realized and a fix on its way, our wider community was already informing each other without prompt.

Infinite Flight does have the perfect recipe for this. Like any good pilot, we're always learning. We do know that when you utilize the power of your community, you unlock one of the keys to building and maintaining a successful company.

We have a wide global community, and we’d like to invite all who can make it. We’ll be in a location where you can do a little plane spotting, so get your cameras ready! We also have a little surprise in store for those who come and take the best photographs. If you’ve never been to London Heathrow, now is your chance. The airport is constantly alive with interesting movements, and if we are lucky we may catch one of the recently introduced British Airways retro liveries!

So, if you have the 15th of June 2019 free, come out and meet many other Infinite Flight users. We’ll be there from 11-5pm British Summer Time (1000Z to 1600Z). The exact location depends on the weather during the day, so keep an eye on our social media outlets as the event approaches.

We look forward to seeing you there!

"We want X"

This is the phrase we hear the most. Sometimes it's in the context of a carefully worded feature request on our community forum, and sometimes it's a single word. Each customer has a slightly different and customized set of expectations that dictate what they feel they should receive in exchange for their hard-earned buck. This isn't something we take lightly or with a grain of salt. Our customers and community are what makes us what we are. If you build a sub-par product or expect too much of the customer, you'll find you don't have a customer to listen to.

At Infinite Flight, we have two main groups of feature requests; aircraft and non-aircraft. Aircraft requests include types and variants, features (eg gear tilt), liveries, and so on. Non-aircraft requests usually revolve around adding clouds, weather, and 3D buildings. The two categories aren't mutually exclusive.  Indeed, sometimes a feature from one category can't be delivered without a feature from the other. In responding to the "we want x" cries, we need to do more to educate our community on what's involved in that statement.

Conversely, you might be wondering if working in one category delays production in another. Well, that depends. We're a small team and there is some overlap in terms of developer resources. Co-founder and CEO, Laura Laban is our lead aircraft developer. If she is working on aircraft models, most of the work on ATC and multiplayer will wait.

What is a rework?

A common misunderstanding when we share a work-in-progress with our community is that a new feature must equal a rework. For clarity, a rework for Infinite Flight is a completely new aircraft model and is the same as building a new aircraft. As standards increase for aircraft quality with more powerful devices and better technology, reworks become necessary to keep our fleet up to date. This is one of the reasons behind our decision to move to a subscription pricing model, as opposed to individual aircraft purchases. The subscription revenue allows us to maintain our fleet, and not make decisions based solely on following the money trail.

By contrast to a rework, we have what is sometimes referred to as a "soft rework" or simply the addition of new features. For example, we released the A320 series of aircraft, followed by a soft rework which brought wing flex, updated landing gear animations, and new liveries. The model quality on the A320 was performing well, so adding features in addition to updates to LOD (Level of Detail) made the most sense. For the adventurous, LOD refers to the level of detail we render at long distances. For example, if you see another aircraft at a half mile away, we don’t need to render things like the pitot tubes and antennae. This gives us fewer things to render, making it render more quickly and use fewer resources.

Developers also factor in the usage of our aircraft on the multiplayer servers. If a certain aircraft is getting a lot of attention but isn't up to current standards, it may be time for a rework. Community engagement and requests are an interesting component to this. At the time I write this blog post, the top 5 aircraft in the air are:

• B777-300ER (9.4%)
• B787-9 (8.7%)
• A320 (7.7%)
• A380-800 (6.1%)
• B787-10 (5.6%)

Stats courtesy of fpltoif.com

These stats are actually in contrast to what we see in our community engagement. This means that either there aren't as many fans of the A330 rework as our social media channels would have us believe, or users simply won't use the A330 until it does get a rework. Either way, our features forum category plays a large part in helping us determine what will keep our current user base interested and engaged.

Forward-compatibility is also something our developers have to take into account. I asked Laura how much this comes into play:

Having aircraft that were released over a span of 6 years coexist on the same system is a challenge. We've gradually updated configuration files to make sure older models are compatible with new features. We did that for lights, camera positions, and so forth.

We will sometimes come across the comment, "... but nobody asked for this airplane." This is a statement I love responding to on social media. The forthcoming A-10 Warthog is a great example. Our military aircraft fans have been waiting patiently and quietly for fighter reworks, and they'll be very pleasantly surprised when the A-10 is released in v18.6; our last release of 2018. But they're not the only consideration here. As it turns out, the A-10 (though badly requiring a rework being one of our oldest in the fleet) was the perfect testing ground for a new feature to Infinite Flight. Sorry though, folks. No spoilers in this post! Suffice to say that this new feature will be a game changer, and will set a new precedent for aircraft moving forward.

Acquisition vs Retention

Retaining users on a subscription model is hugely important. Keep a user waiting too long for their most-requested feature, and you'll lose that user. On the other hand, your product must evolve in order to reach new markets.  Taking Infinite Flight into a real-world light training market, for example, won't happen by reworking the A330. What would help are better low-level terrain graphics, and real-world approaches and charts.

The balance between acquisition and retention will continue as we strive to improve flight simulation on a mobile device. To our community we say, thank you. To new friends stopping by for the first time we say, welcome aboard.

Our front-end coding and creative people have been hard at work to bring you this new platform, which will take our communication to new levels. Being a community-centric company means not just sharing, but sharing with purpose. The Infinite Flight Community Forum is a strong and vast source of information if you're digging into the simulator. That's not going to change.

What would you say it is... you do here?

Our blog will integrate with the forum in some pretty cool ways. You'll see a summary of topic replies from the forum on each blog post with an invitation to continue the conversation. The overarching benefit as we blog will be having a single source of information directly from Infinite Flight without looking too far.

If you are joining us for the first time, you're invited to join the discussion on the forum. It's free and it's full of avgeeks ready to help or just chat about all things Infinite Flight, and aviation.

Meanwhile, back at the blog our goal will be to share more. Our development process has been historically secretive for very good reasons. With mobile development, our friends at a certain app store may decide that we need to change something that involves a complex rework. This happened to us during the TBM release; something we now refer to as TBMgate or Soongate around the office. For this reason, we have two options: share progress without ever giving firm dates (or even approximate dates), or say nothing and roll out marketing after app store approval. We've opted to go with the former.

So, what does this mean for you? It means you get to watch and join in on the discussion as we try new things. It also means you might see us communicate something that doesn't work, creates mass panic, and causes our bosses to regret ever allowing this blog to exist. What could go wrong?

Thank you for joining us, and as always, we'll see you in the Infinite Flight skies!

We recently announced a few changes here on the forum. Most notably, we made the announcement of new moderators being added to the team. We have made our decision and we would like you all to join us in welcoming both @Damian and @ewanfleming to the moderation team.

Both have been very active in the IFVARB and have shown a great level of commitment. They are well known amongst the Infinite Flight community and we look forward to seeing them in this new moderation role going forward. We also have to say thank you to Sam Keast who has stepped down as a moderator. We wish him well in the future.

You can find their profile below where you can congratulate them!

In addition to social media work and community engagement, Misha will be a European liaison for our team at real-world events. He will soon also be working to build our Virtual Airline engagement as that becomes more of a priority for Infinite Flight.

For those who don’t know Misha, he is a charismatic and enthusiastic part of our community who wears really great socks. ?