If you live in the European Union and interested in obtaining a pilot license for your personal use, besides an internationally recognized private pilot license (PPL) you also have an option to obtain a so-called light aircraft pilot license (LAPL).
LAPL is a light aircraft pilot license designed to be a more affordable and accessible alternative to private pilot license (PPL) within the EU. It is:
- expected to be generally 20–25% cheaper than PPL; and
- less demanding in terms of requirements.
For example, to meet the syllabus requirements for an LAPL, you must fly a minimum of 30 hours. On the other hand, to obtain a PPL in Europe, you must fly a minimum of 45 hours.
LAPL medical requirements are less strict as well. LAPL medical certificates cost less (~140 EUR vs ~230 EUR for Class 2 needed for PPL) and valid longer as you get older. Prices given are valid for the Netherlands.
An interesting fact. If you want to fly a drone for commercial purposes, you also need an aviation medical certificate. And the minimum is precisely a LAPL medical certificate.
Restrictions
This license has its limitations, like:
- license is only recognized within the EU and cannot be converted abroad;
- maximum allowed passengers to carry is limited to 3;
- MTOW (maximum take-off weight) of the airplane under your control is limited to 2000kg.
- license is incompatible with ICAO-recognized ratings, like night or instrumental rating, thus not allowing you to extend your pilot priveleges.
Furthermore, many students progressing with LAPL training syllabus tend to convert their syllabus to PPL sooner or later. The reason is simple: the most of them fail to obtain the reasonable level of skills within the tight limit of 30 flying hours. As they have to train more, their flying hours keep accumulating and even exceeding the minimum for PPL. So, if you fly as much as PPL demands you, why not just get it instead and get rid of all the LAPL restrictions?
Of course, syllabus conversion in the middle of the training will give you more headache than if you had been pursuing PPL from the start. You will have to fly more dual and solo hours. If you got to the point of completing your qualifying cross-country solo under LAPL syllabus, you may have to fly it again for PPL, as the distance requirements differ (80 nautical miles for LAPL, and 150 nm for PPL).
RPL
In the Netherlands, before 2018 there was a Recreational Pilot License (RPL) which was constrained to the airspace of a single country. This license was available before the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) consolidated the aviation authorities of European countries and before the LAPL was introduced. Currently, RPL is no longer available and training organizations do not offer it. However, they do offer conversion from RPL to LAPL.
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