Planning a flight

Planning a flight is done on the Pilops website, before you open the simulator. Everything you decide here, the aircraft, the load and the fuel, is what the Pilops Client will track once you connect. For a guided walkthrough of a first flight, see Your first flight; this page is the reference for each step.

Starting a plan

Open New Flight. The page lists your aircraft, with search and filters by owner, category and status, and shows the Passengers Capacity and Cargo Capacity of each. Picking an aircraft creates the flight immediately and opens the Active Flight page.

You can only have one flight open at a time. If you try to start another you get "You already have an active flight". Other reasons an aircraft cannot start a flight:

"Aircraft is currently in use" — it is already on a flight.
"This aircraft is currently in maintenance" or "Aircraft maintenance required" — see Maintenance.
"Aircraft rental period has expired" — see Renting an aircraft.
The aircraft has no hangar assigned. Assign one for free from the aircraft page before flying. See Hangars.
The aircraft is listed on the Marketplace. Remove the listing first.

If you have no aircraft at all, the page offers "Get started", which opens the onboarding that gives new pilots their first aircraft. See Onboarding.

The four steps

The Active Flight page is a checklist in four steps, Aircraft → Cargo → Fuel → Confirm, with Back, Next and Cancel in the footer.

Aircraft

A summary of the aircraft you chose, with its capacities. For a company aircraft it says "This aircraft belongs to … You are operating as a company pilot." If the aircraft is outside the company's operating area it warns "This aircraft is currently outside its operating area." See Hubs and operating area.

Cargo

The jobs available at the airport where the aircraft is parked. Sort them with Highest Payment, Shortest Distance, Fits Capacity or Lowest Weight, and click Add to load one. The Payload Summary groups the load by destination with the Destination Revenue and Total Revenue. Three bars show how much of the aircraft's Fuel, Cargo and Passengers capacity is used. The details of how jobs work are on Cargo and passengers.

Fuel

A slider to add or remove fuel, with the price per unit, the Cost of the change, and the Available Weight for Fuel left after the cargo. Clicking Next after a change opens a confirmation with the amount and the Payment method (your personal account or the company's). See Fuel.

Confirm

The Estimated Profit "for the current preflight setup", the Configured Load by destination, the Total Passengers, the Active Destinations, the Origin Airport, the Fuel Level and the aircraft. There is no start button here. The notice reads: "Open the Pilops simulator client and begin the flight there. Pilops will automatically detect the start as soon as the simulator session is active."

Estimated profit

The estimate is the sum of the payments of everything on board. The real profit is computed when you park: the payment of each delivered job, the streak bonus, minus the 10% flight fee. Fuel is not deducted from the estimate because you paid it already. See Fees and Flight history.

Changing your mind

Until the flight starts in the simulator you can go back to any step, add or remove cargo and change fuel.
Cancel in the footer asks "Cancel preparation? … Unsaved changes will be lost." and cancels the flight. Jobs go back to the pool; fuel already bought stays in the aircraft.
After the flight starts, the load is locked: "You can't modify your cargo because the flight has already started."