A Curated List of Checkride Questions - Part 1

October 7, 2021

I have frequently been checking the /r/flying subreddit over the past couple of months and have found a very interesting theme repeated regularly; Students asking for checkride oral questions a couple of days before their Checkride. So I thought it might be interesting to put together a curated list of checkride questions submitted in these submissions over the years to make it easy for new students to find and review them before their checkride!

I found this particular Reddit thread to be quite interesting, so I thought it would make a great start to the first part of this series


Q: If an airport on the sectional has a star on top of it, what does that mean?

Q: If you accidentally fly into IMC, what would you? First step?

Q: Here is one that my DPE asked that I really enjoyed: Would you rather fly a plane that is overweight or out of balance?

Q: You decide to take a friend flying for a quick x-country trip, you climb to your desired cruise altitude and about 20 minutes in they start sweating and getting all shifty. Generally uncomfortable but starting to look a little pale. Identify the situation, how do you proceed?

Q: You are flying into a class D airport, but the as you approach the edge of the class D airspace, you see that the visibility has diminished to 2sm between the edge of the airspace and the airport. What are your options?

Q: You go out and preflight your plane and notice your right position light is not functioning. It’s clear and a million in the daytime. Walk me through the steps you’d take to make sure you can fly. What steps could/should you take beyond what’s required to be safe?

Q: Your TAF at your departure airport is clear until 2 hours after you will be back at your airport, but you notice that storms seem to be moving towards you and not away. How would you determine the safety of the flight and both airports at your times of arrival? And explain why you would use what you do.

Q: What are the THREE things required to fly in Class B airspace? I showed the examiner the TWO FAR requirements, but he insisted on a third 'thing', which I provided, but it was the wrong word, right idea.


Feel free to check out the original Reddit thread to read more about the replies to each question, and if you are looking to schedule your checkride, take a look at our DPE search engine.