FlightSim Community Survey 2018 Results

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FlightSim Community Survey 2018 Results


Navigraph

The typical flight simulator enthusiast is a 43 year old male from the United States. He flies simulators 2-3 times per week for about 5-10 hours in total and was introduced to flight simulation 20 year ago. There is a 27% likelihood he already has some sort of pilot license. If so, he was introduced to flight simulation before he pursued his pilot license. Moreover he has a bachelor’s degree, is full time employed, makes 50,000 USD per year before tax, and spends about 250 USD on software and 200 USD on hardware annually. He prefers X-Plane 11, but Prepar3D v. 4 is also popular.

Largest and Most Comprehensive FlightSim Survey Ever
These are some of the conclusions from the annual FlightSim Community Survey 2018 organized by Navigraph together with 19 partners. More than 15,000 respondents contributed which makes this survey the largest of its kind. With 77 questions it is also the most comprehensive, covering demographics, as well as simulation preferences and habits. This year the survey also incorporated specific questions on Virtual Reality. Moreover, partners were invited to contribute with questions of particular interest to them. One such example is the use, perception and preference of freeware versus payware.

The final report is shared openly with the community for everyone’s benefit. Each partner is also receiving a customized report presenting their user group in respect to the total community to promote development and recruitment of more pilots to the flight simulation hobby.

To track trends another survey will be published in November 2019. The emphasis will be on diversifying the sample by including additional partner organizations. Companies, organizations, and developers within the flight simulation community are already now invited to contact Navigraph to discuss next year’s set of questions.

X-Plane Going Strong
Consistent with the previous community surveys conducted 2016 and 2017 by Navigraph, the X-Plane simulator from Laminar Research continues to grow in popularity also this year. X-plane is now on par with Lockheed Martin’s Prepar3D.

The question regarding primary flight simulator software was elaborated in this year’s survey to allow respondents to estimate how frequently they use a particular simulator. While X-Plane and Prepar3D seem to be equally popular, respondents claim to fly Prepar3D more frequently.




Full survey results: here