Fly UK 2024 Survey results

Review of the 2023 Fly UK Members survey data

Welcome to our long-overdue feedback on the data from our member survey conducted in 2024. Whilst many sim surveys exist, including the annual Navigraph survey, this is our opportunity to look at what our members experience during their time here at Fly UK and give the staff team valuable insight into what we do well and what we could do better. Although these results have been delayed in publishing, they have already been well utilised by the team in our planning. Our next survey is planned for late 2026

Firstly, a thank you to all our members who took part in the Navigraph surveys. It was incredible for Fly UK to feature in the top five list of VA's in the Virtual Airline category, beating some equally long-established real-world airline-based VAs and some of the larger "virtual logbook" organisations, by which we mean fly anything, anywhere. In fact, we'll start our in-depth look into our data by sharing the results from that Navigraph survey section on VA's.

Before we dive into the results, a big thank you to all who participated and the positive comments and constructive feedback you left as part of the survey. As a staff team, these results and your views are important to us. Can we accommodate every idea and request? Sadly not, but we do year on year review all of this data to help us guide the VA through its ongoing growth and development to best cater for the interests of its members.

Navigraph  Survey - Virtual Airlines

As we'll cover in the survey, Fly UK is unique in the way it operates as a fictional entity but based around real schedules and fleet, so even though we are well established in the sim world, the staff team were amazed to see us feature so highly, thanks to our community. Whilst the appeal of short-haul ops with real-world operators such as vRYR and vEZY are clear, these VAMSYS-based airlines tend to be limited in scope in terms of Fleet choice and area of operation, but we understand that 1-2 hours flights are generally the sweet spot for Airlines sim users, and the top three here are the real-world definition of that type of operation. 

What is surprising for us is to see the similarity between Delta Virtual and BAVirtual, both heavy hitters in the VA arena and similar types of airline to what we aim to recreate here at Fly UK

Now we'll dive into our survey data.

Fly UK Membership

Subtle differences exist in the membership data compared to the previous survey. What has been healthy to see is an increase in the percentage of members that have stayed with Fly UK and moved into the 3-5.6-10 and 10+ year categories. We have a slight increase in UK-based members; however, our international membership remains positive and strong.

The bulk of our members continue to learn about Fly UK via web searches; this trend has not changed significantly in recent years.

 Our next set of membership based question focues around why choosing Fly UK and other VA interests. The top four influencing factors of Brand, Fleet, Website and routes remain the top choices compared to prior results, howver its great to see a marked increase in community and reputation as an influential factor to join Fly UK.

The data surrounding members who also fly for other VA's has not changed significantly since the previous; however, on this occasion, nobody selected the "Not realistic enough" option, which has a 4.9% score previously.

Sim Preferences

This section covers general flight sim preferences, including but not limited to Fly UK. Nturally the Flight Sim landscape has continued to evolve since these results were obtain but still gives a useful snapshot into the community.

It's important to note that at the time of the survey, MSFS 2024 was not released; no doubt this will feature more in the next survey.

The Fly UK MSFS user base grew 10% since the prior survey, most of the feed for that coming from FSX and P3D users whcih declined from 14.4% to 7.3%. Xplane userbase also declined from 11% to 8.1% withth emajority of those users now on XP12.

The question about sim platform change is a little dated now that 2024 has been with us for over 12 months. It will be interesting to see the next survey data, as many users, we believe, made a slow transition or remain on 2020 while 24 matured.

Data results in the next section have not changed significantly; however, there is growth in the use of high-end/study-level payware addons whcih form the bulk of usage in our membership surveyed.

The next question is a little redundant, as much has changed in Fligtsim aircraft addons howver still gives a very interesting insight into what aircraft our membership uses or plans to get. The PMDG 738 should be no surprise as the standout short to medium range Boeing product, howver combines all the Airbus A320 options, and they top the charts.

Navigraph and Simbrief continue to rule the roost in flight planning preference and have grown their share since the last survey. PFPX, Avlasoft and Routefinder are the casualties. Inbuilt sim tools and Little Nav Map have seen a slight increase in share.

Offline flying share remains consitient howver a small lean towards a mix of both offline and online from pure online has occurred. The introduction of better third-party ATC software may be an influence here when online networks are not manned.

Vatsim stands out on online network use once again, and its high results remain consistent; IVAO has had a small % decrease. Multiplayer and Fly UK FSD increased; we have since replaced the FSD with Unifly, so it will be interesting to compare in the next survey.

The next section focuses on aircraft Genres the membership enjoys flying, this always gives us a great indsigt particuallry when we get requests for things like historics, bizjets, etc.

It's no surprise that modern airliners stand out in this category; this is, in essence, the heart of Fly UK operations and why folks join. Stepping back through the age catogories we see a sharp drop in older and classic jet airliners, although people do enjoy dabbling in them from time to time. Compared to the prior survey, the "not interested" result segment has risen significantly.

Modern Turboprop has mixed results but is consistent with past results. With the bulk of members on MSFS, aside from the ATR, there is a lack of quality products in this segment.

Moving away into other categories, the results remains consitent with past trends with many "not interested" results. with General Aviation being the only other category frequently visited by our members.

It's worth comparing these trends against the Navigraph survey result, which is below our charts.

And finally, in this section, the areas of the world our members like to fly, very little change here with Europe and North America, followed by the Australasia region.

Navigraph results 

Flying with Fly UK

In this part, we investigate the habits of members participating in Fly UK's offering.

In choosing how often you fly for the VA, the majority of our members fly weekly or fortnightly. There has been an increased inmmerbers flyting multiple. In choosing what aircraft you fly, we have seen increases in members who only operate one single type and those who like to vary things with multiple types.

Influence on the aircraft you own has seen a marginal shift toward medium and low priority 

It's no surprise that the narrowbody airliner remains the top choice for most memebrs, this hits the sweet spot of flight time and realistic operations for most. The results are consistent with the prior survey findings.

Where to fly is directly linked with this fleet choice and again is almost an exact copy of previous results and highlights the importance of mixing and refreshing operations to give plenty of choice.

And once again, Fly UK short haul opeerations stand out in member preference. The other categories remain fairly consistent, with only Auaroa declining in preference. The Aurora fleet was very niche and not well represented in MSFS, so we'll watch the next survey with interest to compare after changes were made in 2025.

A new question for the last survey around callsigns, we've always historically used a blanket UKV/Skyways, but added CET/Cetan, so this was added to gauge member reaction. Whilst not a significant difference, there is some interest in unique identity across Fly UK operations, so it will be monitored in future.

Lastly, in this section, Fly UK features ratings. This gives us the ability to focus on any areas for improvement that members feel are required, as well as what's working well. Generally, you have rated things very well whcih is great to see. The store was a requested addition but hasn't scored well or badly, so it will continue to be kept under review; it's not highly utilised.

Fly UK Community / Member interaction

This section explores elements of the Fly UK member community experience.

Our website homepage, Press releases and NOTAMs continue to head the methods used to keep up to date with Fly UK. We added the Blog as an option, so that's not represented. Forum and Discord have swapped places for keeping up to date with Fly UK news.

Motivations for joining a VA have remained almost identical to the prior survey, but community and replicating real-world airline ops have seen a small percentage increase.

Community interaction in this survey remains more forum-driven, but discord clasoed the gap significantly. In recent times, since this survey, Discord has been the more active community platform, so the next survey results will be interesting to see. Should also be noted that Teamspeak is no longer used within the VA, replaced by the Discord voice features.

Social media use across the membership remains varied, with Facebook and YouTube being the most used platforms

Asmall increase inmembers using our discount programs. Inibuilds was added to the list since this survey. Many still don't know we have these available.

Real-world events' interest has increased slightly; we are now due our third visit to FSWeekend in 2026 with a record Fly UK turnout. Sadly, the UK-based show still does not exist for us to enjoy. Other UK opportunities need some investigating.

Fly UK Features

This section explores current and potential features of Fly UK and how important they are to you.

In this section, we explore features that we feel our members may enjoy, whilst we can't action all of them...for example, we previously asked about Simbreif integration to our dispatch system whcih was accomplished and now widely used by our members. Results from the remaining question remain consititent whcih gives us a good aim for future developments.

Next, we get into some details about operations and setup. Your opinion about operational realism vs freedom remains consistently high in the "don't change" range.

Fleet groups were a new question; we have updated some of our substitution policies since, but held short of major changes. Data for further review for us and has fueled some staff discussions.

Mirroring real-world fleet choice has changed a little; the number of members saying it's not important has decreased, but the balance between "very important" and "happy either way" has moved a small amount towards the latter.

Mirroring realistic destination choice has seen a big shift towards "Very important"

Finally, you feel our Fleet rank system is very important and integral to the VA, however many of you feel there could be some beneficial changes. Thanks for all the suggestions made in the free-text section. Only 3% felt the system limited their enjoyment of the VA 

Fly UK Events, flying Club and resources

This section explores the other aspects of the Fly UK experience away from the main VA operations 

Events - This data is new to the last survey and will need comparison in the next survey. What it does show is that the majority of members fly outside of events with a mixed response as to why they choose not to join. It should be noted that we have switched to Unifly since this survey, and whilst it wasn't specifically a question, the complex nature of setting up the old FSD server system was known to be a barrier.

For event timings, evening and weekend stand out as preferred timings. We have added some occasional Saturday afternoon and evening events; however, actual participation hasn't necessarily reflected these results. 

Flyin Club participation remains an active part of the VA, although a large share of members dont particiapte in its activities, no surprise really given the focus of the VA, 42% yes response is however encouraging. 

Flying Club Tours are a popular feature with a mixed response on specific Flying Club webpages and liveries.

Now we explore the Resource Centre and how our members seek knowledge in their sim flying. Its encouragin to see a good use of our resource centre guides for information,n but the bulk of members use YouTube guides to learn about sim flying techniques and procedures, something you would like to see more of from the VA.

Flying procedures are the most popular topic  you would like to expand knowledge on