Psychometric tests for pilots: the COMPASS series

Choose a test: COMPASS series

• PFD flying

  Fly a primary flight display: bring the pink flight director cross onto the small aircraft symbol, set the speed to its target and keep the slip ball centred. Coordination and divided attention.

  Three minutes in three phases, with new targets every minute. Keyboard, touchscreen or gamepad, on a tablet or a computer.

  Take the PFD flying test

• Orientation

  Three dials (RMI, artificial horizon, heading indicator) give a position: find, among seven aircraft on a map, the one that matches. Spatial awareness.

  20 questions in 20 minutes, from the easiest to the hardest, with the heading and the relative bearing drawn from the correct aircraft. Mouse or finger.

  Take the orientation test

• Short-term memory

  Four flight parameters appear, then some disappear, and you type back the missing ones, with their letter then their value. Short-term memory.

  12 trials with one to three parameters to recover and less time to memorise at each level. Keyboard, on-screen keypad or finger.

  Take the short-term memory test

Your history and statistics are kept on this device; neither your score nor your results are sent to a server, unless you ask for a personalised tip yourself.

What is in the COMPASS series?

The COMPASS series has two exercises that draw on flight instruments: flying a primary flight display (PFD) and orientation from three dials, the RMI, the artificial horizon and the heading indicator. The first trains coordination and divided attention, the second spatial awareness.

PFD flying lasts three minutes, in three phases of one minute; orientation has 20 questions in 20 minutes, from the easiest to the hardest. The second asks you to read the three instruments: the matching guide explains how to read each one, but the exercise does not replace studying instrumentation in your course.

How to approach each exercise

• PFD flying: the cross in small touches

  The pink flight director cross counts for half of the score, the speed and the ball for a quarter each. You command a rate of rotation, not a position: press briefly, release, look at the bar, then correct. As on a control column, pushing pitches the nose down and pulling pitches it up; decide in your first session which sense you keep.

  The guide: PFD Flying Test: Keep the Pink Cross Centred

• Orientation: attitude, heading, relative bearing

  To find the aircraft among the seven on the map, read the artificial horizon first for the attitude (the aircraft's arrow), then the heading on the heading indicator, then the relative bearing of the beacon on the RMI. The classic trap is mixing up left and right: put yourself in the aircraft, facing its nose.

  The guide: RMI, horizon and heading: reading three dials at once

• Short-term memory: stick to the four letters

  Four parameters, one letter each (F, A, H, S): repeat them in your head while they are shown, then, once one or more have disappeared, type their letter followed by their value. Do not mix the letters with the digits they precede: the letter first, the value next, one keystroke at a time.

A practice plan in two parts

1. PFD flying: in the first days, aim only for the cross and deliberately ignore the speed and the ball, to find the movement. Then add the ball, then the speed, anticipating it at each change of phase. Stay with a single control device (keyboard, fingers or gamepad) so that your flights remain comparable.
2. Orientation: learn by heart how the numbers on the heading dial are read (3 for 030°, 6 for 060°, 12 for 120°, and so on), then repeat the set with the corrections on, which draw the heading and the relative bearing from the correct aircraft.
3. Two or three flights per session are enough: beyond that you repeat more than you learn.

The guide: Psychometric tests for pilots: where do you start?

Our guides to help you succeed

• Psychometric tests for pilots: where do you start?
• RMI, horizon and heading: reading three dials at once
• PFD Flying Test: Keep the Pink Cross Centred

What the COMPASS series is not

The exercises of the COMPASS series are practice exercises, not official tests: they do not reproduce the test of any school or airline, and they measure neither your medical fitness nor your level as a pilot. A good score in practice does not predict the outcome of a selection.

ForAllPilots is not affiliated with any test publisher or any organisation. The exact rules and scoring of a selection test may differ from those of these exercises.

Frequently asked questions

The other sets of exercises

Each series has its own page, with its exercises, its practice tips and its guides.

• Air France - ENAC (FR)

  13 exercises, in French only.

• BQ

  Another set of exercises: cube comparison and cube nets (spatial awareness), matrices and figure series (logical reasoning) and word problems.

• CUT E / AON

  A third set of exercises: deductive reasoning, matrices, the multitask landing, directions (spatial transformation), position around a beacon (GYRO / RBI) and coordination with the tunnel.

• DLR

  A fifth set of exercises: cube folding, the triangles, data processing, trajectory prediction, the rotating maze, the corridors, timed calculation, 2D and 3D spatial orientation, the two vigilance tests and information perception and processing (spatial awareness, rule-based lookup, anticipating a hidden movement, staying oriented despite a rotated picture, visual and auditory memory, calculation under a time limit, vigilance and divided attention), and VLR - Spatial Orientation and the figure series, two exercises from other series also offered here.