FAA Registry Update
January 7, 2026 to June 10, 2026
Covering about 5 months of registry activity · light aircraft under 12,500 lbs, drones excluded
Between January 7, 2026 and June 10, 2026, the FAA registry added 2,521 light aircraft and removed 1,276. The registered fleet grew by 1,245 to 268,170 aircraft. That works out to about 16 new registrations a day, with the fleet gaining about 8.1 aircraft daily.
More than one in 4 new registrations (25%) were amateur-built aircraft.
Beech saw more removals (75) than registrations (49), a net loss of 26.
Bell saw more removals (37) than registrations (25), a net loss of 12.
Fixed wing single engine aircraft account for 75% of all new registrations.
Anatomy of the additions
Factory-new is an estimate. The FAA records a new airframe without a year or an airworthiness date and fills them in later, so an undated addition counts as new when the FAA holds it under the manufacturer's dealer certificate, or its serial number is newer than any dated example of the model. Checked against additions the FAA later dated, the rule catches about 97% of new airframes and lets through none older than three years.
83 years old and back on the books.
Models not seen last month
Type-certificated models absent from the previous snapshot
What's being registered
When they were built
Manufacture decade of the 743 additions with a year on record. Most new aircraft arrive without one, so this chart leans toward returning airframes.
Who's registering
New registrations by manufacturer
- 1 Cirrus Design Corp 400
- 2 Piper 223
- 3 Cessna 209
- 4 Cessna (Textron) 195
- 5 Pilatus Aircraft Ltd 68
Most-registered models
- 1 Cirrus Design Corp SR22T 193
- 2 Cessna (Textron) 172S 74
- 3 Cirrus Design Corp SR22 73
- 4 Cirrus Design Corp SF50 71
- 5 Piper PA-28-181 67
Where they're landing
- 1. Minnesota 312
- 2. Florida 270
- 3. Texas 190
- 4. Kansas 178
- 5. California 173
Fleet churn
1,276 aircraft left the registry this period. Leaving is not the same as leaving the sky. Many return after paperwork catches up. The chart below shows registrations vs. removals for the most-active manufacturers.
Re-registrations inflate both sides
An ownership transfer or N-number change can appear as both a removal and an addition of the same airframe. These counts reflect registry activity, not aircraft entering or leaving service.
Methodology
Comparison of FAA Releasable Aircraft Database snapshots dated January 7, 2026 and June 10, 2026, filtered to Class 1 light aircraft (under 12,500 lbs, drones excluded). An added N-number is a new registration, not necessarily a new airframe. The FAA records changes with a paperwork lag. Manufacturer logos are trademarks of their respective owners, shown for identification; image sources and licenses are listed in the logo manifest.