Summer 2026: Fleet Data, PDF Export, Flight Tracking, and More

It’s been a few months since the last update, and a lot has happened. A bunch of new features, a race sponsorship, and I’ll be at Oshkosh next week. Here’s everything.

“We had the logbooks before we had the plane in the shop. It let us start researching previous work before the owner had to drop the plane off.”

— A&P mechanic, added to a customer’s hangar

Fleet Watch: What Changed in the FAA Registry

Before we get into app updates, here’s something for us data nerds.

Our aviation data project, The Small Planes, now tracks monthly changes to the FAA Aircraft Registry. Here’s the highlight reel from the latest update (June 10 to July 10):

• The US light aircraft fleet stands at 268,381 registered aircraft
• 496 aircraft joined the registry; 285 were removed; net gain of 211
• Cirrus led all manufacturers with 68 new registrations; the SR22T alone accounted for 31
• Cessna saw a net loss of 16 (56 removed vs. 40 added)
• More than 1 in 4 new registrations (27%) were amateur-built
• The oldest aircraft to rejoin the registry: a 1947 Navion A, 79 years old
• Top states for new registrations: Florida (73), Minnesota (59), Texas (28)

The Small Planes is built on the same FAA registry data that powers BetterPlane’s tail number lookup (it’s how your N-number auto-fills aircraft and registration details when you add an aircraft). The full update has manufacturer churn charts, type breakdowns, and more.

Logbook PDF Export

This is a feature I’ve been excited to ship. Whether you’re sending records to a buyer during a pre-buy, handing off to your A&P for annual, or just want an additional backup of your logbooks as a PDF, you can now generate one from any logbook. Each export has a cover page, a closing summary for completeness verification, and is fingerprinted so BetterPlane can later validate its authenticity. This is useful for proving validity to buyers, or for keeping a verifiable backup copy of your records. BetterPlane follows FAA guidance on electronic record-keeping, and the fingerprint is part of that commitment to authenticity.

Each export includes a shareable download link. Most are ready in under 30 seconds; you’ll get a notification when it’s done. Exports stay available for two weeks.

Generate a PDF, get a notification when it’s ready, download or share the link. The recipient can view your logbook without needing to be added to your hangar.

Flight Data Tracking

When you log your aircraft’s hours, you can now enter consumption data like fuel usage and oil added (per-engine for twins) along with destination and notes as part of the same flow.

The new Flight Data section gives you three views: Trends (interactive fuel and oil charts), Flight Log (your flight history with destinations and notes), and Oil Log (consumption tracking with rate calculations). You can edit past records, and export each as CSV.

For oil tracking specifically, we added a standalone Oil Top-Off entry for between-flight additions, with tach pre-fill and validation. The app calculates oil consumption rates (qt/hr or hr/qt, your preference) from consecutive additions, so you can spot trends before they become problems.

AD Reference Lookup

BetterPlane has always extracted AD references from your logbook entries. What’s new is that those references now link directly to real FAA Airworthiness Directive data. We maintain our own sync of the FAA AD database, and when you tap an AD in a logbook entry, you get the full directive details, current status, and version history without leaving the app.

The matcher is built to handle historical and superseded ADs; it resolves the chain so you can trace from an old directive to its current replacement. You can also share AD details or open the directive in the FAA’s Document Retrieval System.

Tap an AD reference in any logbook entry to pull up the full directive, status, and supersession history from our FAA AD database.

Next up: AD compliance reports and improved automatic AD tracking across your aircraft.

PDF Import

On the scanning side, you can now import logbook pages directly from a PDF file. If your mechanic sends you a PDF of completed work, or you have a scanned logbook sitting in your files, you can bring those pages into BetterPlane without re-scanning them. The importer splits multi-page PDFs and queues each page for extraction.

Smaller Improvements

A lot of quality-of-life improvements shipped across these versions:

• Fullscreen logbook swiping with PageView navigation for faster browsing
• Document rename from the long-press menu
• Component editing so hangar members can update aircraft components and add notes
• Dial input for logging hours with remembered entry method preferences
• Tap-to-locate alerts on the aircraft overview with smooth scroll-to
• What’s New dialog showing release notes when the app updates
• Fractional date alert display (e.g., “1.8 years remaining” instead of rounding)
• Back-to-top button on the aircraft screen for quick return to the annunciator panel
• Dozens of stability fixes, crash guards, and performance improvements across both platforms

Currently in Beta

Engine Compression Tracking

Engine compression check tracking is live in beta. Record readings per cylinder, track them across annuals, and see how each jug is trending over time. This is how you catch a cylinder going soft before it gets expensive.

“The last thing keeping BetterPlane from replacing my spreadsheet is the ability to track compression readings.”

— BetterPlane customer

This is version 1; future versions will extract compression data directly from your logbook pages.

Record compression readings during each annual or borescope, and watch the trend over time. The app also includes summarized compression testing guidance from Lycoming, Continental, and Rotax with references to the original manufacturer documents.

Improved Search

A better search experience is coming soon to beta: recency filtering, sort by date, and per-logbook search, so it’s faster to find the exact entry you’re after.

Web App

BetterPlane is also in beta on the web. Access your aircraft, logbooks, and records from any browser.

AirVenture Cup Race Sponsor

BetterPlane is a Bronze sponsor of the AirVenture Cup Race, the world’s premier amateur cross-country air race. Now in its 28th year, this 400-mile race for experimental and factory-built aircraft runs on July 19 and traditionally kicks off the week of EAA AirVenture Oshkosh. It captures the spirit of the classic Bendix Trophy races.

Current Version: 1.11.2

The current public release is version 1.11.2 on both iOS and Android. If you’re on an older version, update to get all the released features above. The items in the beta section above are not part of this public release.