Air India's cadet portal says the cost is shared after enrolment. The number is still findable, from its academy's own brochure and from cadets already in the programme, and this page keeps those two things clearly apart.
Air India is the one Indian cadet programme whose airline publishes no fee at all, so every number on this page comes from a brochure or from cadets, and is labelled that way.
Those are the exact words for what is going on here, and they are worth keeping apart. Air India's cadet portal states that details of the training cost are provided once a candidate is enrolled, before training starts. Its partner academies use the same language. So an airline-stamped programme fee is Not publishedon any Air India page, checked 15 June 2026, and every figure on this page is somebody else's.
That does not make the number unknowable. Its own academy prints a figure in a circulated brochure, and cadets who have been selected talk about what they paid in public. Both are real evidence. Neither is a price list, and this page labels them accordingly.
Fly High is Air India's ab initio cadet route: ground school, flying to a commercial pilot licence, and then a type rating on the aircraft you will fly, ending in induction as a Junior First Officer. It runs on two geographies, and which one you are routed to changes the cost more than anything else about the programme.
The India route puts the flying at AIFTA in Amravati, Maharashtra. The United States routes put it at partner academies in Arizona and Florida, with the DGCA conversion done afterwards in India.
| Route | Where you fly | Reported all-in | Who reported it |
|---|---|---|---|
| India, through AIFTA | Amravati, Maharashtra | about ₹1.1 croreReported | the academy's own circulated brochure, corroborated by selected cadets |
| United States | Arizona and Florida, converted in India | ₹1.4 crore to ₹1.5 croreReported | selected cadets, itemised by academy |
| Air India's own published fee | either route | Not publishedon Air India's cadet portal, checked 15 June 2026 | the portal defers the cost to enrolment |
Sources for the reported figures: the AIFTA academy brochure, and cadet accounts posted in public aviation forums, swept across nine channels on 15 June 2026. One community itemisation of the India route breaks it into the CPL, ground school and the type rating and sums slightly above the brochure figure; selected cadets describe higher totals still once incidentals are counted. We publish the band rather than any single itemisation.
A figure of about ₹85 lakhReported circulates as though it were the whole programme. It is not. It is the United States ab initio flight-training segment, and the type rating and the DGCA conversion are both added after it. Quoting it as an all-in cost understates the programme by a very large margin, and it is the single most common mistake made about this programme online.
The other thing to be careful of: the India route's first intake is recent, so the India figure is a brochure and forum number rather than a settled figure from graduated cadets, and the United States figures move with the dollar.
Air India sets its own eligibility for each intake, and it moves between them: Physics and Mathematics at 10+2, an English requirement, an upper age limit and a DGCA Class 1 medical you can pass are the constants. Read the eligibility on the advertisement for the intake you are applying to; a rule copied from a previous intake is how a candidate loses an application.
Selection runs as an online application, a screening and aptitude assessment, a psychometric stage, a group exercise and an interview, with the Class 1 medical alongside. A payment exists at the selection stage; its amount is Not publishedon any Air India page, checked 15 June 2026, and the amounts quoted for it in forums are not corroborated, so we print none.
This is the part that catches families out, because it is cash on top of the fee rather than part of it. Selected cadets report a deposit of ₹30 lakhReported, handed over as three cheques and forfeited if you break the service commitment. Air India publishes nothing: a bond term is Not publishedanywhere Air India speaks for itself, checked 14 June 2026, so treat the deposit as a thing to ask about in writing rather than a settled term you can plan around.
Air India publishes no figure. Its own portal says the training cost is provided once a candidate is enrolled. What cadets and its academy brochure report, and we therefore label Reported, is roughly 1.1 crore for the India route and 1.4 to 1.5 crore for the United States routes, both including the type rating.
No. That figure comes from a Fly High brochure and covers the United States ab initio flight training segment only. The type rating and the DGCA conversion are added after it, so it is not an all-in number and should not be read as one.
Air India does not publish bond terms. Selected cadets report a deposit of 30 lakh, given as three cheques, forfeited if you break the service commitment. That is Reported, not a published term, and you should ask for it in writing.
The flying happens in dollars. The same licence, the same type rating at the end, and a materially larger bill, which is why the reported India and United States figures differ by roughly forty lakh.