5 hours ago, tpete61 said:

Can you go into more depth as to what your poll is for?

These pop up often on Avsim and for the most part I’m not sure what these polls accomplish or serve?

The gentlemen below have answered well, so I don't think I need add anything.

 

5 hours ago, Christopher Low said:

Is curiosity not enough?

 

3 hours ago, Ron Lefebvre said:

They are just fun.

Gives you a chance to see what others are doing and up to.

 

Edited January 3Jan 3 by JYW

7 hours ago, Daube said:

The choices in this poll are too limited, none of them correspond to my usage.

Rather than just point this out, it would have been interesting if you'd expanded on how you do enjoy the sim?

Edited January 3Jan 3 by JYW

Only small single Piston, VFR, sightseeing, small hops never longer than 2 hours, training with my real aviation apps (SkyDemon/Foreflight), testing my sceneries...

100% GA for me hence why my simpit is called a Cesper 58. 
 

CESsna

piPER

baron 58

Didn't vote as couldn't relate to any of the categories. I know I'm probably atypical, but I don't really "fly" anything, in the sense of piloting an aircraft. But I've got around 300 vehicles (if I include a few boats and suchlike) and that means stuff in pretty much every aircraft category, from Avro to weird X-Plane (not the sim) one-offs. And I love to use them all. Whatever takes my fancy at any point. Last few days it's been the Hawker Fury or Avro Vulcan, but just before that the 737Max, F28 and a couple of Pipers.

It's a flight sim, and I love to fly (in the like a bird sense) in fascinating and good looking aircraft. Oh, and a few ugly ones, as well.

Some very interesting results so far!

I am surprised that the relative % of simmers who fly both airliners and GA-type aircraft in equal measure is so low! (It's where my vote went).

It seems most of us are drawn quite strongly to one of the two main aviation segments.

Just a word about users who feel their use doesn't fit any of the categories.  This is acknowledged and respected.  The thing will polls is that two aspects will really distort the poll and make the results less clear;  one is having too many discrete categories, so that the trends get diluted and spread too thinly. The other is having a very general 'catch all' option, that ends up gaining the most votes but doesn't explicitly tell us much.

20 minutes ago, JYW said:

I am surprised that the relative % of simmers who fly both airliners and GA-type aircraft in equal measure is so low! (It's where my vote went).

Yes, quite surprised too. I'm in the fifty/fifty category. 

Just depends on how the mood takes me; Comanche for a local trip sightseeing or my 737 into somewhere like Bergen from Gatwick if I have a couple of hours to spare.

That's the beauty of flight simming.. 😎

I'm actually surprised to see the GA numbers this high as I often get the feeling on Avsim that I'm lost in a sea of airliners! 

I fly GA exclusively - currently single and multi-engine piston and lighter single and multi-engine turbo-props.  Primarily piston, as that's what I owned and flew IRL, though I admit that I've been spending more and more time in Black Square's TBM 850 and Turbine Duke lately and have considered a future light jet purchase.  (Don't tell anybody!)  I love flying into small to medium sized airports and appreciate the flexibility to fly to the smaller towns and cities I prefer IRL, though I occasionally fly into a regional or smaller air-carrier field from time to time.

Doubt I'll ever get into the modern airliner thing.  Bus driving on routes determined by someone else just doesn't appeal to me.  😄

All in good fun, people.  All in good fun!

 

Scott

90% GA. No interest in having virtual passengers (including a co-pilot) so even with the RJ which is the biggest aircraft I fly, I only fly the cargo version. No interest in airliners and none in military aircraft beyond anything I could imagine buying as decommissioned. I don't think I have ever flown for more than two hours in any sim in my life. A typical flight for me is an hour or so in a GA aircraft, nearly always at dawn with live weather. I never know what I'm going to fly until the sim is up and running but I usually fly in one of only about half a dozen places, mainly from A to B and sometimes in a very large circle from A and back to A again. 

21 hours ago, tpete61 said:

Can you go into more depth as to what your poll is for?

These pop up often on Avsim and for the most part I’m not sure what these polls accomplish or serve?

 

You've frequently professed an interest in what other simmers here on AvSim think/believe do.

Well, here you go!

 

4 hours ago, tttocs said:

Bus driving on routes determined by someone else just doesn't appeal to me.  😄

That's exactly why, when I do fly the Big Iron, I stubbornly fly only Biz Jets (incl BBJ/ACJ "airliners") and Cargo: "You Buy, We Fly - Any Time, Any Where!" 😎

On 1/2/2026 at 7:40 AM, JYW said:

What type of flight simming do you use MSFS for?

Please complete the poll above.

Add a comment below to expand on your preferences if you like 😎👍

 

I love polls like these - thank you!

I did a parallel(?) one last year asking how many different addons people fly, and I was shocked to discover the high number of folks who fly (literally) just a couple addons more or less exclusively! 😮 

I mean, heck, I only fly a few SIMULATORS! 😉 

I mainly fly in DCS World, and there mainly the Hornet, Tomcat, Apache and Black Shark, with regular but infrequent warbird flights (getting my toes wet with the F4U Corsair now - learning to crash land a 2000HP radial engine taildragger on a small aircraft carrier does wonders for immersion!).

Believe it or not, I mainly fly training missions there (mostly punishing myself with Tomcat carrier landings and night flights in Apache), or flights of historical prominence. For me, it's far less about the Pew Pew than in understanding how each era of aircraft meets its requirements and how military aviation went from Fokkers to "Dark Stars".

For the Civ Sims, I fly in X-Plane and MSFS, and until very recently, in Prepar3D. Again, it's all about trying on High Fidelity / Study Level addons, or at least whatever's the best rendition available.

In terms of MSFS, I'm finding that v2024 plus a few Hi Fi addons have really hit my sweet spot when it comes to flight simming in general, so 2024 is where i'm spending time if i'm not in DCSW. I've built a ridiculously large collection of addons across the complete spectrum of aircraft. Again, that historical hands-on interest is what usually grabs me by the wallet 😉

Given v2024's rough launch and addon compatibility delays, I found myself spending most of the time in the Cessna Longitude and the FSR500 (both worked perfectly since launch day and are relatively simple yet deeply simulated), with a bit of sightseeing keeping an eye on how the helos were coming along (slowly!).

Given some recent releases as of the last 30-ish days, I'm experiencing a change in interest and thus flying time. Now it's trending towards the Taog's H500C (OH-6), A2A Comanche, and - for now - finally "going deep" on 738 BBJ2. Not too sure about the 738, though. Pending an eval of the new FSW LearJet v2 (once it's available thru MP), that could easily scratch my Fast Jet itch, and the TDS GTNxi would then give me a standard nav system across my primary addons.

This is all driven by a plan to fly to and explore all the Hand Crafted MSFS airports in some kind of Around the World in 80 365-ish Days walkabout. The jet to get there, the Comanche for a relaxed regional sightsee, and the H500C for the local PoI's. I'm gonna have to be flexible and use Historical Weather to get decent visibility, but it's largely a grand sightseeing tour, so... 😉

Edited January 3Jan 3 by UrgentSiesta

GA most of the time (probably 99.99%).  This includes the Kodiak, Bonanza, TBM, Starship (absolutely love this), CJ4 & Longitude (and occasionally, others).  I want to add some more Black Square aircraft - very impressed with them!

I have taken a few airline flights - they were OK but haven't given me the level of enjoyment I get out of the others.

I'm upgrading to a new VC and slowly setting up 2024.  After I'm more established in '24 I'll proceed with a couple of airliner add-ons, but they are not a high priority at this time.

I fly exclusively GA.  Pre MSFS, I used fly planning software to create VFR plans with 1-2 days of 4-6 hour flight with "nightly" layovers.  I'd fly the plan over about a RL week or so, depending on the time I had to spare for sim flying on any given day (.5 to 2+ hours).  All this came crashing down with MSFS and its essentially non-existent "save flight".   I never really got over it, so I do far more goofing off flights now (and no way would I go back to FSX).

Edited January 4Jan 4 by TheFamilyMan

Mostly GA for me. Airliners seem to be more system oriented and less "flying oriented". But I don't mean to be judgmental. To each his own. I occasionally dabble in fast jets or vintage planes just to play around. 

Also I just don't feel like putting in the time for an airline flight. I do however, fly into and out of airports that are part of my travel plans. For example I'm heading to LA next week and have used the BS Professional Baron to fly into Burbank , KBUR, several times to understand the layout and what the pilot of the A320 I'll be flying in sees and does on the approach. I'm sure lots of folks have done this same thing.

Edited January 4Jan 4 by mikegrr