One question trips up more logbooks than any other: does simulator time go in your total? The short answer is no — it's a separate category. This guide explains how PilotIQ handles it and why.
Simulator time is its own category
Time in a flight simulation training device (FSTD) — a full‑flight simulator, an FTD, or a basic aviation trainer — is logged separately from airborne time and is never rolled into your aircraft (airborne) total. When you add the device in My aircraft, turn on the Simulator toggle — no registration needed, just name the device — and every session logged against it stays in its own bucket.
Two numbers on your Home screen
Because of that separation, the Home screen shows two figures:
- Total hours — your airborne total, hours actually flown in an aircraft.
- Total experience — the combined figure, aircraft + simulator together.
Keeping them distinct means you can always answer "how many hours have you flown?" and "how much total experience do you have?" without one contaminating the other.
Why it's separate — and how it still counts
This isn't a PilotIQ quirk; it's how the regulators treat it. CASA, the FAA and EASA all account for FSTD time separately from aircraft time, and each caps how much synthetic time may be credited toward a given licence or rating. So:
- Your airborne total is what most recency and hard aircraft‑hour minimums look at.
- Your simulator hours still count toward eligibility up to the limits your authority allows — instrument time, procedures training and certain course credits — which is exactly why the combined Total experience figure is the one that maps to licence and rating eligibility.
How to log it right
- Add each device once in My aircraft with the Simulator toggle on.
- Log the session against it like any flight — role hours from a sim (dual, or command per the device's credit) still flow into your Dual and PIC totals, they just don't add to airborne time.
- Check both figures on Home: your airborne Total hours and your combined Total experience.
Confirm the exact synthetic‑time credits and caps for your licence or rating with your authority — PilotIQ tracks the hours accurately, but the crediting rules are theirs.