Your CFI recent experience, on one card.
✓ Reviewed by a pilot
A flight instructor certificate issued on or after December 1, 2024 has no expiration date. To teach, you still need recent experience within the last 24 calendar months: a FIRC, a CFI practical test, a strong pass record, or one of the other 61.197 options. Put in the month your 24 months started and this card shows the last month, the window that keeps it, and puts it on your calendar. Free, and it stays on this phone.
Your 24 months
The next date, years on. The board renews on this cycle but hasn't posted this date yet; check the 14 CFR 61.197.
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How to renew
- Pick one way (14 CFR 61.197(b)): pass a practical test for a rating on your flight instructor certificate or an added one; or, in the last 24 calendar months, endorse at least 5 applicants for a practical test with at least 80 percent passing on the first attempt; or serve as a company check pilot, chief flight instructor, part 121 or 135 flight instructor, or in a job that regularly evaluates pilots; or pass a U.S. Armed Forces instructor pilot or examiner check; or instruct in WINGS (15 activities, 5 different pilots, and a phase of your own in the last 12 calendar months); or finish an approved FIRC.
- FIRC? Pick one from the FAA's provider list. It counts only if you finished it within the 3 calendar months before you apply (61.197(b)(2)(iii)), so send in your paperwork within 3 calendar months of graduating (AC 61-65K).
- Send FAA Form 8710-1 to an ASI, AST or authorized designee with the FIRC graduation certificate or your records. In the FAA's examples, your new 24 months end on the last day of the 24th month after the month it goes in.
- Keep your month. Finish in the 3 calendar months before your last month and the last month stays the same (61.197(a)(3)). The FAA's example: an August last month, done in May, June, July or August, keeps August.
- Old card with an expiration date? A certificate issued before December 1, 2024 expires 24 calendar months from the month it was issued, renewed or reinstated (61.19(d)(2)). Establish recent experience "prior to the month of expiration" (61.197(e)) and the FAA issues a new certificate without an expiration date (AC 61-65K).
- Put the new date on this card and the new RE date in your endorsements. Bonus: meeting 61.197 inside your flight review period skips the flight review's 1 hour of ground training (61.56(f)).
If your 24 months run out
- No flight instructor privileges until you reinstate them under 61.199 (61.197(c)). You file a signed application with the FAA either way.
- 3 calendar months or less past your last month: an approved FIRC, or a CFI practical test, puts you back (61.199(a)(1)).
- More than 3 calendar months: a flight instructor practical test for a rating you hold, or for an added rating (61.199(a)(2)).
- The certificate itself stays: a part 61 certificate without an expiration date "is valid unless it is surrendered, suspended, or revoked" (61.19(a)(2)).
Where every number comes from
- Recent experience within the preceding 24 calendar months; when the period starts; the options; old certificates: 14 CFR 61.197
- Reinstatement: FIRC within 3 calendar months, a practical test after that: 14 CFR 61.199
- Issued on or after Dec 1, 2024: no expiration date; before: 24 calendar months: 14 CFR 61.19
- Period examples, FAA Form 8710-1, the RE date in endorsements: FAA AC 61-65K (Nov 14, 2025), paragraphs 30 and 31, Appendix A
- Current FAA-authorized FIRC providers: FAA: FIRC provider list
- The Dec 1, 2024 change, the 3-month window, examples: FAASTeam: CFI certificate expiration date? Transition to recent experience
- (f): CFI recent experience skips the flight review's ground hour: 14 CFR 61.56
Checked November 11, 2026.
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