Last updated on January 24th, 2026 at 12:00 pm
X-Plane Flight Simulator – Simulation Game Review
X-Plane Flight Simulator is a Simulation game from Laminar Research, first launched in 17th December 2014.
It’s rated 9+ and currently has 24,178+ ratings on the App Store.
What Makes X-Plane Flight Simulator Stand Out
The most realistic aircraft. The world at your fingertips. It’s not a game, it’s a flight simulator.
▶ "Highly recommended." — Mel Martin, Engadget ◀
▶ Featured by Apple in "Best New Games" ◀
▶ Over 1 million downloads! ◀
Come experience why real pilots fly X-Plane.
It starts with the flight model—the same flight model used in our FAA-certified desktop simulator—that’s complete enough to model the flex in your wings & the tilt in your landing gear.
Add to that our desktop-quality aircraft with multiple liveries and interactive 3-D cockpits—so detailed you can do a full startup procedure using the hundreds of buttons, knobs, & switches in the cockpit. With working gauges, flight displays, & more, these cockpits are as realistic as those in our full desktop sim.
But aircraft are no good without a place to fly them. That's why each of our 5 ▸free◂ regions features detailed terrain, lifelike city buildings, & 3D airports—complete with terminal buildings, jetways, hangars, & more.
Want more? Subscribe to unlock global scenery, and get access to over 37,000 airports, with more than 11,500 airports featuring 3D terminals, hangars, & more.
▶ FEATURES
√ 9 ▸free◂ tutorials, teaching the basics of takeoffs & landings, traffic patterns, helicopters, & more
√ Massive multiplayer with thousands of other pilots and controllers in a single shared world (Professional subscribers only; non-subscribers can get free trial flights for a limited time)
√ Fully interactive cockpits on many aircraft, wired to real systems models, with working gauges, displays, buttons, & switches
√ Full startup procedures supported on many aircraft (optionally start any aircraft from cold & dark)
√ More than 50 systems modeled, each of which can be failed on command
√ Emergency scenarios
√ Combat missions
▶ AIRCRAFT
The app includes 2 aircraft (plus 5 scenery regions) for free. In addition, the following aircraft are available as in-app purchases:
• ▸Free!◂ Cessna 172SP w/ 4 liveries
• ▸Free!◂ Cirrus Vision SF50 w/ 5 liveries
• Cirrus SR22 w/ 3 liveries
• Cessna Citation X w/ 3 liveries
• Airbus A320 Airliner w/ 3 liveries
• Airbus A330-300 Airliner w/ 3 liveries
• Boeing B737-800 Airliner w/ 3 liveries
• Boeing B777-200ER Airliner w/ 3 liveries
• Boeing B747-400 Jumbo Jet w/ 3 liveries
• Bombardier CRJ200 Regional Jet w/ 3 liveries
• Douglas DC-3 Airliner w/ 3 liveries
• McDonnell Douglas MD-80 w/ 3 liveries
• A-10 Thunderbolt II (“Warthog”) Fighter
• F-22 Raptor Fighter
• F-4 Phantom II Fighter
• Beechcraft Baron B58
• Beechcraft King Air C90B
• Piper PA-18 Super Cub
• Piaggio P.180 Avanti
• Sikorsky S76 Helicopter
▶ SCENERY
5 scenery regions are ▸free◂ for everyone!
• Oahu, Hawaii
• Grand Canyon
• Seattle/Tacoma, Washington
• Juneau, Alaska
• Innsbruck, Austria
Global scenery is available by purchasing a monthly or yearly subscription.
▶ MULTIPLAYER
Come join tens of thousands of other pilots and controllers in a single, shared world!
Try the Fly-In of the Day to meet up with hundreds of other pilots, or explore the MMO world for more chance encounters.
Massive multiplayer is in early access—we wanted to get it in your hands as soon as possible—so we’re going to continue adding new features & improvements over the coming months.
Terms of Service available at: https://www.x-plane.com/x-plane-mobile-terms-of-service/
Download X-Plane now to experience aviation like never before.
This Simulation game offers engaging gameplay and regular updates for mobile players.
Player Feedback
As a newer release, X-Plane Flight Simulator is building its player community. Early feedback suggests .
Recent Updates & Development
Latest Update: 22nd July 2025
Recent improvements include:
HD badges for our high-quality aircraft
Bug fixes and improvements
Download & Availability
X-Plane Flight Simulator is available through the official App Store for iOS devices.
Get X-Plane Flight Simulator on App Store
Requirements: Requires iPhone 5s / iPad Air / iPad Air (Cellular) / iPad Mini 2 (Retina) / iPad Mini 2 (Retina, Cellular) / iPhone 6 / iPhone 6 Plus / iPad Air 2 / iPad Air 2 (Cellular) / iPad Mini 3 or later.
Compatible with iPhone and iPad devices.
Player Experience Highlights
Community Insight:
You dont only have to tilt to move like theres a joystick and up and down arrows and stuff like that make it easier.
Lots of planes, airports and fun.
Need help though!! App turns off when choosing free flight plus just got the annual membership.
Guys please add new update with free planes and airports and this is also a great game we teach on this game.
Ive been using explain for years now we think its a really good quality company with a quality product and not overly priced. We also think the owner is a great guy and a true American.
But for some reason it keeps crashing now in the freeflight mode.
Ive been plying this game for about a year and when we got our phone we started buying planes all of them are really good. Theres some like the A320 that are a bit harder to control though. Theres a few things that we think should be added, the main 2 are: 1. Real satellite imagery on the ground 2. More liveries; for example, an Avelo B737 livery, and an Emirates B777 livery.
Seriously, it is. Sometimes it will randomly close when we try to turn it on, but we think that might be due to our device. Besides that its great.
This is a really god game with real physics. This is not just a game someone made just for money they put in effort to make a good game. There is fun challenges. The only bad thing is that it takes a while to load. Other than that we really enjoy it we think its a must get game. We also like you just move your device around to control it. 5 stars.
This game lets you take the wheel and gives you a first hand account of what it is like for pilots! Now of course, it has its flaws, but overall it is fun! Even though most of the other planes cost money, its usually just a few bucks (Im talking 5 dollars at most). One thing we do want to address is that if you dont know the controls of a real aircraft, we dont recommend you get this game. One last thought is that if you are below the age limit, you will probably struggle with flying. In that case, we recommend you dont get it and leave the reviews alone. Anyways, thanks for reading.
We Like the Game its very realistic we just think that you should make more airplanes free like The Boeing 747.
We dont know, but it may be our internet (starlink). But it keeps crashing when we play in live mode. All in all. It is a great way to fly. Wish there was like different cessnas to fly like the caravan and 207s to fly.
Please make all the planes and helicopters and jets for free please Im begging you.
We love this simulator and hope you add more to make it better. Also we wish there would be like in game money instead of using real money 5of5 love this game.
When we all the time wanna play the game it takes forever to load we just wanna play it. It looks like a very nice game but it takes long to load. It takes like two or one minute and we really want you to fix that cause we wanna play it a lot. So can you please fix that we wanna play the game because it looks so fun and so realistic but we cant play it. If it doesnt load, please read this book for updating.
Ive been plying this game for about a year and when we got our phone we started buying planes all of them are really good. Theres some like the A320 that are a bit harder to control though. Theres biggest thing this the terrain. We think that if the graphics at least used satellite images it would be so much better.
The game comes with the really popular airports and two planes, the cirrus vision jet and the Cessna 172 our personal favorite. The physics on the game are the best of the best. We have tried playing every mobile game and none have even come close to as realistic and simple as this game. You can go on to a massive player mode where everyone will fly around the Seattle Tacoma airport and even become freinds. If you tend to stay away from the crowd then you can go to free flight and go forever. It pauses in free flight but not massive multiplayer Which is our biggest dislike. We would like to become a comershal pilot and living close to the buissiest airport it has help turn our dream into reality but it helps even more coming home to do a quick flight from PDK to Gwinnett. If you get this game get the full pack not the location. It gives you the full fleet and let's you go where ever for only $7 a month. The locations of the game are not great and does not let us fly to our house or even a place we recognize, but when it comes to airports it is spot on. Trying most big flight simulators on mobile devices this is the one. Another great feature is the challenges and tutorials it gives you to prepare for a real flight. Now if you have a PC you read this for no reason, go get Microsoft flight sim. It's just the best. All in all just buy the game and the big pack.
It is so fun and it lets you fly planes like fighter jets and others and it also tests your skills on different types of planes sometimes you can not fly some planes, but some could let you practice on it and some give you a timer if the timer runs out then youre done with the plane and logged you back in to the starting page. It is like heaven for us.
We work for the Airlines and Ive flown before and this simulator brings enough world class simulation for flight training in comparison to other simulators on the App Store for the price point. Its real smooth with the controls and you can control everything from an iPAD PRO really well. We wish you were able to attach the yoke and the throttle to the iPad Pro to make it a real life simulation of the flight training. Well worth the money though.
Honestly this app is really good. The thing we dont like about it is the plans are very expensive. Its $100 for a whole subscription and its $100 a year and its not very worth it because its just like its just an app and its not very fun to do and we really dont like it so this is why we did it when we were a kid. We really loved it. We think we definitely recommend it if youre a kid.
Are we getting a a320 that will be free add on update what do we need to do if it happens.
This game is very fun Im not a plane lover ourselves but we still like to play this game. When Im bored.
This is the best flight sim great copit and graphics best flight sim ever besides msfs25.
We think they should add an a350 if you want want to go on a ultra long flight we also think they should add more liveries.
We downloaded the game and it was pretty fun but it didnt last long because when we looked at the other planes we were disappointed because you needed to pay for the planes can you remove the price for them btw great work.
Fun game. We wish the map would display your flight plan course on it. Also, when flying in third person it would be nice to see compass course, altitude and airspeed instruments on the bottom of the screen like in MSFS. Also, we play with an Xbox X controller and we wish there was a way to assign your own function to each button. Id like to set it up just like MSFS controls. Other than that this game is awesome. Feels like a portable version of MSFS. Real impressed. Totally worth the subscription cost.
Fix the auto throttle on the 737. It wont disengage when we disconnect autopilot.
It says that cockpits are interactive but on some planes they are not ,please make them all interactive.
Having XP wherever you go is very nice. However, you can't get mods to get more planes (other than the ones you can buy). The graphics aren't as nice as the desktop version, but we feel that that is a necessary trade-off to prevent lag. Other than that, we love it.
We love x plane mobile, mainly because Im an aviation enthusiast, but one thing we will say is please add more planes in updates consistently please. Like for example add maybe an a321 neo with the mask and make it detailed like the a330 or maybe add the 737 max variants in more detailed and interactive cockpits like the 737 but you can push more buttons. We get it its hard as a developer but come on dude you have to add more airliners from time to time not just one year yes and then in another two years like no. And also we feel like the free scenery is very limited we saw other reviews saying the exact same thing we want more places to land and takeoff we dont always want to be landing at Seattle or insbruik please developer if your reading this please add the following suggestions it would make a lot of people happy.
We love this sim so much! But theres a couple of cons about the sim. First of all you have to pay for all of these different planes! Second the Cessna and vision jet both veer off track even when calibrated straight and even. Third is you should make planes and global scenery free, please thats all Im asking is make the pro subscription free or just a one time purchase type of thing. One more quick suggestion is to make a couple new planes with a realistic interior. Like the A380,321,777x, and freighter planes. Other than that its an awesome simulator with lots of realistic features.
Not only is this one of the best flying sims that doesnt even lag on our old iPhone 6 but it has working systems ?!?! There are a couple bugs though like on the Cessna 172 when you turn on the computers it only turns one on.
We personally think that if you buy an airplane you should get at least global access bc if you get an actual passenger aircraft you should be able to fly wherever your heart desires we bought the 737 and Im not disappointed we love it and the interactive cockpits but you should be able to take it wherever on earth overall we think the next update should have what we said and we would love a response from the developer thank you.
Pls pls pls pls pls pls in game money not real okay?And pls have ohare airport for free and airports around it like 1c5 airport. Thanks.
Best simulator so far this game is really good we recommend that Im telling you best game we play this game every single day and time we have.
Best plane game ever love 737-800.
Its so hard to land in flight scool and we have To sursibe we wont subsirb.
This game is kinda underrated like why bro Everything is cool and all but WHY THE HECK DO we HAVE TO PAY FOR PLANES? AND THE WORST PART? WHY DO PEOPLE ONLY GET 2 AIRPLANES FOR FREE like bro please add in game currency. Still 10/10 for this sim. You should buy it IF you have money.
We have been waiting for X plane to add realistic water physics and they finally did thank you guys for doing that.
Really fun. Ill keep it short and sweet. We hate how you have to pay for the planes, but you didnt get two planes for free.
Amazing flight sim the best mobile flight sim cant think of anything better.
The game is very good but we really dont like the subscription part. It is very expensive and we just want to fly where we want without any worries. Please fix this and you will have 5 stars in no time.
We think this game is REALLY fun, but the one thing Im bummed about is A, how long it takes to load, like man. We just wanna play! And B, its really annoying how you have to BUY the planes. You only get 2 planes to start off with, and they get old. QUICK. Overall though, we would recommend this flight simulator.
Very good, high quality sim but some of the controls are hard to do, and some are impossible. For example the concentric knobs to tune frequency, nav, etc. And it would be really nice to have them fixed.
We like it a lot. Its really fun once you figure out auto pilot but two planes and theyre small. You could make four with the two planes and two big planes. We really want self clean but four dollars for it is a lot for just a plane.
Okay, So This is one of the best flight simulators Ive seen, Its got pretty realistic graphics and crashing, But one thing that we really dislike about most realistic flight simulators is the fact that you usually dont get the option to use like a joystick for the plane, You have to use like phone motions and stuff, Its more just annoying but other then that, Its pretty peak. But we hope the devs see this and will try to make it where mobile players have the opportunity to use a joystick.
Its very good but it takes long to load so please fix that.
We love this game. It is the best game Ive ever had personally it is very realistic, but the only problem with the game is Ive only had one secure landing because the controls are hard cause you have to lean the iPad and if theres a setting part that you can use joystick our mistake, but if there isnt, please fix this cause it is hard to move the plane by leaning your iPad, so our suggestion is get a joystick so you could move the plane like it and then this point this would be way easier to move. We know it would be more realistic, but just the option please fix this. Thank you.
It's really fun but there's one problem like why you have to spend money for the planes like why you have to why just wach a ad then we would rate five stars only if you chang the price to an ad or just pick any plane you like like why pay for it.
We have enjoyed this app for quite a while now but for the last month or so we havent been able to enter free flight mode as the app crashes and closes as soon as we do. We have an iPhone 15 pro max which is only a little more than a year old so what gives.
User feedback from Apple App Store
App Details
- Version: 12.3.6
- Size: 1,035.63 MB
- iOS: 16.0 or later
- Languages: EN
- Content Advisory: Infrequent/Mild Cartoon or Fantasy Violence
- Developer: Laminar Research
Last updated: 22nd July 2025 | Genre: Simulation | Developer: Laminar Research