Private Pilot License (PPL) Theory Exams

The theory phase of the PPL(A) license is intended to lay down the foundation of knowledge for the future aviator.

It is divided into 9 subjects that you can see down below sorted by order of difficulty:

• Communications
• Human Factors
• Operational Procedures
• Air Law
• Aircraft General Knowledge
• Flight Planning and Performance
• Meteorology
• Principles of Flight
• General Navigation

During the course, the student will attend the theoretical classes taught by his flight school. Once the classes are finished, he will prove the knowledge acquired in the different subjects by taking internal exams at the school. With the internal exams passed, the student will be able to take official exams.

 

Official exams

To successfully pass these exams, three requirements must be met:

• The student has 18 months to pass all the exams, counting from the end of the month he took his first exam. This is, if our first official exam was the 16th of May, the 18 month-period starts to count from the 31st of May.
• The student has 6 sittings available. Each sitting lasts 10 working days. This means we can distribute the 9 subjects in 6 different sittings.
• The student has 4 attempts per subject. We can fail an exam a maximum of three times, on the fourth attempt we would have to pass it.

These rules also apply when sitting for the official ATPL exams and are common for all students from different countries under EASA legislation. In case of running out of time, sittings or exam attempts, the student must restart his exams, but before attempting again, he must have attended a refresher course at his flight school.

Structure of the exams

The exams are all multiple choice with four possible answers a) b) c) d). Marking an incorrect answer or leaving it blank does not add points but does not penalize either, we therefore recommend answering all questions. To successfully pass you need a score of at least 75%.

Each subject is assigned a different number of questions and time available. The distribution is as follows:

Air Law                                                           16 questions/0:25 h

Human Factors                                                8 questions/0:15 h

Meteorology                                                    8 questions/0:15 h

Communications                                             8 questions/0:15 h

Principles of Flight                                         16 questions/0:25 h

Operational Procedures                                 12 questions/0:20 h

Flight Planning and Performance                 16 questions/0:35 h

Aircraft General Knowledge                          24 questions/0:40 h

General Navigation                                        12 questions/0:25 h

Taking theoretical exams is much more complex than you may think and you may still have some doubts left. To avoid making the article very long, Private Pilot Exams has created a list of the most common F.A.Q. from our students.

We hope you enjoyed the reading. See you up in the air!

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