Type Rating for Pilots in India: What It Is and How CPL Holders Get One

What is a type rating?

A type rating is an endorsement on a pilot’s licence certifying that they are qualified to act as a crew member on a specific aircraft type — not aircraft in general, and not even every variant of the same family. It sits on top of the CPL or ATPL rather than being part of it, and it is examined and issued separately from any DGCA written paper or the licence itself.

The distinction matters because it is the single most common gap between a fresh Commercial Pilot Licence holder and someone an airline can actually roster. The licence proves you are qualified to fly for payment in general; the type rating proves you are qualified to fly one particular aeroplane.

Which aircraft actually need one?

Broadly: multi-pilot aeroplanes, turbojet-powered aeroplanes regardless of weight, and any aeroplane with an all-up weight of 5,700 kg or more. DGCA’s crew licensing and recency material — the CAR Section 8 Series ‘F’ series governing recency and Pilot Proficiency Checks for multi-pilot aeroplanes and aeroplanes above 5,700 kg — is the applicable framework, published on dgca.gov.in. The light single-engine trainers used for CPL flying hours sit well under that threshold, which is exactly why the requirement never comes up during initial training and then arrives all at once once a candidate starts looking at airline aircraft.

What you need before you start

A TRTO will check every item below before accepting you onto a type rating course. Missing one does not fail the course — it stops you from starting it.

Your 200-hour CPL flying record does not need to include any time on the target type — that is precisely what the type rating course itself is for. What it does need is to be current and unrestricted, with nothing outstanding against the licence.

How the TRTO process actually works

Type rating training runs at a DGCA-approved Type Rating Training Organisation. DGCA publishes its own list of approved training organisations, and confirming an operator’s current approval for the specific type and variant — not just the aircraft family — is the first check to make before paying anything.

Airline-sponsored vs self-sponsored

A type rating reaches a pilot one of two ways, and the difference changes both the financial risk and the timeline.

Under an airline-sponsored or cadet route, the operator selects candidates first and funds — or bonds — the type rating as part of onboarding, usually onto whichever aircraft it currently needs crew for. The candidate takes on little or no upfront cost, but has no choice over the type and the seat depends entirely on that operator’s own hiring decision.

Under a self-sponsored route, the pilot pays a TRTO directly and holds the rating before applying anywhere. This can shorten the path to a direct-entry first officer role at an operator that already flies that type, since some direct-entry postings prefer or require candidates arriving already rated. It also means the entire cost is at risk before any job offer exists, and a rating on a type no operator in India currently flies has very limited practical value.

What does a type rating cost?

There is no single figure, and DGCA does not publish or standardise type rating fees — each TRTO sets its own, and published estimates from different sources for the same aircraft disagree with each other by a wide margin. Rather than repeat a number that a different provider could contradict within weeks, the honest answer is: request a written, itemised quote from the TRTO directly, and confirm exactly what it covers.

At minimum, ask whether the quote includes ground school, the full simulator syllabus, the skill test itself, and any base or line training the hiring operator requires afterward. A quote that only covers the simulator phase is not the total cost of being employable on that type.

Keeping the rating current

A type rating does not expire the way a document does, but the privilege to use it lapses without recency. DGCA’s recency framework for multi-pilot aeroplanes and aeroplanes above 5,700 kg requires a Pilot Proficiency Check on that type within a set period; missing the window means retraining before the rating can be exercised again, even though it was never removed from the licence itself. A pilot who holds a type rating but has not flown that type or completed a proficiency check recently should confirm current status before assuming they can simply return to the aircraft.

Choosing which type to get rated on

For a self-sponsored candidate, the choice matters more than the training itself. A rating is only as useful as the number of operators actually flying that aircraft in the market you are applying to. Before committing, it is worth checking which aircraft the airlines you are targeting currently operate and are actively hiring direct-entry first officers for, rather than choosing a type on availability of a training slot alone.

Mistakes that waste the investment

• Paying for a type rating before confirming the TRTO’s DGCA approval covers the exact variant you need, not just the aircraft family.
• Treating a quoted fee as final without asking what it excludes — base training, line training and recurrent checks are frequently billed separately.
• Self-funding a rating on a type with little presence in the market you plan to work in.
• Letting recency lapse between the rating and an actual job offer, then discovering a proficiency check is needed before the aircraft can be flown.
• Starting the process before the Instrument Rating, multi-engine rating or English proficiency endorsement are in place, and losing a training slot to a prerequisite that could have been sorted months earlier.

Ground classes at We One Aviation

We have taught the DGCA ground subjects from Dwarka since 2009. A type rating sits well after the stage we teach, but eligibility questions like whether your CPL, medical and ratings will be in order by the time you are ready for one are exactly the kind of planning conversation we have with students long before that stage arrives.

We teach the DGCA ground subjects and arrange flight training with partner flying schools. We do not own aircraft or simulators, we do not employ pilots, and we do not place students into airline jobs — hiring decisions rest with the operator.