To carry passengers at night, the FAA’s night currency requirements say you must have made at least three takeoffs and three full-stop landings during the preceding 90 days, performed as sole manipulator of the controls, between one hour after sunset and one hour before sunrise, in an aircraft of the same category, class, and type as the one you plan to fly. The rule lives in 14 CFR 61.57(b), and it applies only when passengers are on board. A pilot who has fallen out of currency can still fly alone at night to get current again.1eCFR. 14 CFR 61.57 – Recent Flight Experience: Pilot in Command
The Three Landings, and What Counts
Every one of the three landings must be to a full stop. The airplane comes to a complete halt on the runway before you taxi back or shut down. Touch-and-go landings do not count for night currency, even though they can satisfy the daytime passenger currency rule for most airplanes.1eCFR. 14 CFR 61.57 – Recent Flight Experience: Pilot in Command
You also have to be the sole manipulator of the controls for each of those takeoffs and landings. If a flight instructor flies one and hands the airplane back to you, that one doesn’t count for you. When you’re working through currency landings with a CFI, fly all of them yourself.
The 90 days is a rolling window, not a calendar month. Three landings on March 15 expire after June 13. There is no grace period and no rounding. Pilots who fly at night only occasionally should track the date on the calendar, because a single day past the window means you cannot legally carry passengers until you fly new qualifying landings.
The One-Hour Window
The regulation catches people because the FAA uses more than one definition of “night.” For currency, the qualifying window begins one hour after sunset and ends one hour before sunrise at your location. Landings must happen inside that window to satisfy 14 CFR 61.57(b).1eCFR. 14 CFR 61.57 – Recent Flight Experience: Pilot in Command
The general definition of “night” in 14 CFR 1.1 is different. It runs from the end of evening civil twilight to the beginning of morning civil twilight, and civil twilight ends roughly 30 minutes after sunset depending on latitude and time of year. That definition governs when you log flight time as night in your logbook. It does not control currency.2eCFR. 14 CFR 1.1 – General Definitions
A landing performed at civil twilight, or even 45 minutes after sunset, falls outside the currency window. If you are cutting it close on time of day, that landing will not count. Use sunset and sunrise for your specific airport, then add one hour to sunset and subtract one hour from sunrise to establish your window.
Same Category, Class, and Type
Night currency is not a blanket authorization. Your three landings must be flown in an aircraft of the same category, class, and type (where a type rating is required) as the one you plan to fly with passengers. Three full-stop landings in a single-engine land airplane make you night current in single-engine land airplanes only. They do not carry over to multi-engine land, seaplanes, or rotorcraft.1eCFR. 14 CFR 61.57 – Recent Flight Experience: Pilot in Command
If the airplane requires a type rating, currency has to be built in that specific type. Night landings in a Boeing 737 don’t cover an Airbus A320, even though both are multi-engine land airplanes. Pilots who fly more than one type need to track each one separately.
Tailwheel Airplanes
Daytime currency has a specific tailwheel provision: to carry passengers in a tailwheel airplane during the day, the three landings must have been full-stop landings in a tailwheel airplane. The night currency rule in 14 CFR 61.57(b) does not include that language. It requires only the same category, class, and type, and tailwheel is an endorsement rather than a category, class, or type.1eCFR. 14 CFR 61.57 – Recent Flight Experience: Pilot in Command Legally, night landings in a nosewheel airplane of the same category and class satisfy night currency for a tailwheel airplane in that same category and class. Practically, a tailwheel airplane handles very differently on the ground, and reduced visual references at night make the rollout more demanding. Legal is not the same as proficient.
How Day and Night Currency Interact
Night currency counts for daytime passenger currency, because the night landings are full-stop and were flown in the correct category, class, and type under 14 CFR 61.57(a). The reverse is not true. Three daytime touch-and-go landings do not make you night current: they weren’t full stops, and they weren’t in the night window.
Getting Current Again
The rule restricts carrying passengers, not flying the airplane. If your night currency has lapsed, you can fly alone at night and make the three required takeoffs and full-stop landings yourself. No endorsement or instructor sign-off is required, assuming you hold the appropriate certificate and medical and the airplane is airworthy. Log the landings and you’re current.1eCFR. 14 CFR 61.57 – Recent Flight Experience: Pilot in Command
Flying with an instructor is smart if you haven’t been up at night in a while, even though it isn’t required. Night skills, especially depth perception on landing, degrade faster than most pilots expect. An instructor on board doesn’t change the currency math, because a CFI acting in that role is a crewmember, not a passenger.
Simulators
Night currency landings can be done in a full flight simulator, but only under specific conditions. The simulator must be FAA-approved for takeoffs and landings, its visual system must be set to represent the night currency window, and the session must run under an approved course at a Part 142 training center.1eCFR. 14 CFR 61.57 – Recent Flight Experience: Pilot in Command This option is realistic mostly for airline and corporate pilots. Desktop aviation training devices and basic aviation training devices at flight schools do not qualify. For most general aviation pilots, getting current means getting in the airplane.
Safety Pilots Are Not Passengers
When you fly under the hood and a safety pilot is required in the other seat under 14 CFR 91.109, that safety pilot is a required crewmember, not a passenger.3eCFR. 14 CFR 91.109 – Flight Instruction; Simulated Instrument Flight and Certain Flight Tests You do not need night passenger currency just because a safety pilot is aboard during simulated instrument work at night. If anyone else is on the flight who is not a required crewmember, currency applies to that person.
Logging So You Can Prove It
Under 14 CFR 61.51, each flight must be recorded with the date, total flight time, departure and arrival locations, aircraft type and identification, and the conditions of flight, including whether it was day or night.4eCFR. 14 CFR 61.51 – Pilot Logbooks
The regulation does not specifically list the number of full-stop landings as a required field, but noting them is the only practical way to prove night currency. If an FAA inspector asks you to show you were current on a given date, the logbook is your evidence. “Night flight, 1.2 hours” without landing counts forces you to reconstruct facts from memory during an investigation. Record the number of full-stop night landings for each flight, and keep them marked so you can count backward 90 days at a glance. Many electronic logbooks have a dedicated field. The logbook must be available for inspection upon reasonable request by the FAA, the NTSB, or law enforcement.4eCFR. 14 CFR 61.51 – Pilot Logbooks
What a Violation Costs
Carrying passengers at night without meeting the currency requirement is a regulatory violation that can trigger enforcement action under 49 U.S.C. 44709. The FAA has authority to amend, suspend, or revoke a pilot certificate if it determines that safety requires it. Before acting, the agency must notify you of the charges and, except in an emergency, give you an opportunity to respond.5Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 49 USC 44709 – Amendments, Modifications, Suspensions, and Revocations of Certificates In practice, a first-time currency violation without an accident may result in a 30 to 90 day suspension, or the FAA may agree to a civil penalty. Any enforcement action becomes part of your permanent FAA record and can affect future certificate applications, airline hiring, and insurance rates.
The larger exposure often comes from insurance. Most aviation policies include pilot warranty clauses that set minimum qualifications for the pilot in command, and those clauses commonly require currency for all aspects of the flight, including night. If you have an accident while carrying passengers at night without being night current, the insurer can deny the entire claim based on the warranty breach, even when the currency lapse had nothing to do with the accident. Courts have generally enforced these clauses. Arguments that a broker verbally promised a waiver, or that the clause was in the declarations rather than labeled as an exclusion, have not overturned denials. A hull loss or liability claim can run into the hundreds of thousands of dollars, which is where a lapse stops being a paperwork problem.