MySkyForce Flight Training App

Learning the basics of aviation is anything but easy, especially for people coming to aviation with little to no knowledge of how our complex corner of the world works. Don't believe it? Just crack open the FARs for a second and discover how much you've forgotten or never knew. Taking all of that knowledge and putting it into a form that lets folks new to aviation understand is no mean feat. Doing it in a way that helps them understand how every part of the puzzle relates to the other pieces is even harder. MySkyForce pulls off both of those feats.

The app is a little different than the competition, and some very good competition, too, in a number of ways.

MySkyForce incorporates some of the features of top-of-the-line video or online courses from the likes of Sporty's and King Schools, with interactive quizzes at the end of chapters. There's no grading of the quizzes and no keeping track of your progress, but the effect is the same. You can find out how much you know and what areas you need to improve on.

Courtesy of MySkyForce

When it comes to the text itself, the experience is first rate. For starters, MySkyForce presents the material in a way that's not dumbed down but that's still clear and concise. I've been flying since I was a kid, and I learned a few things I'd sort of known before but never really understood, like how the FARs, CFR 14 and the structure of the federal government relate to each other and how to think of category and class in a way that's as simple as manual flaps. And that was just in Chapter One.

Short of an old-fashioned paper text book, MySkyForce is also the cheapest way to cover all the areas of aviation learning you need before you take your knowledge test for Private Pilot or Sport Pilot. The entire course costs just $89.99. By the time you read this, you should have the option of purchasing just one module at a time. If you just want to see what the course looks like, you can download the app and then check out a lesson for free. It's a perfect option for rusty pilots looking to brush up.

MySkyForce isn't the flashiest or most feature-filled way to do your Private or Sport Pilot studies. It's largely text-based, and video components you've seen from the segment's leaders are not to be found. That's by design, however. Company general manager Gordon Krogh says that videos make it hard for the student to visualize the maneuvers, so MySkyForce instead makes use of animations that get the job done really well. In the end, the app is a clean, affordable and effective approach, one that is sure to keep getting even better. It's also one that will help you understand some of the most fiendishly complicated concepts in private aviation while getting you through the details on the way to what we all really want: a pilot's certificate.

MySkyForce is available in the Apple App store, where you can download the app for free and then decide what content to get as you go.

Learn more at MySkyForce.

Isabel GoyerWriter

A commercial pilot, editor-in-Chief Isabel Goyer has been flying for more than 40 years, with hundreds of different aircraft in her logbook and thousands of hours. An award-winning aviation writer, photographer and editor, Ms. Goyer led teams at Sport Pilot, Air Progress and Flying before coming to Plane & Pilot in 2015.