Hello Captains and welcome back. As we say goodbye to 2025 and look forward to 2026, I wanted to share my personal year in review. During this personal opinion post I’ll share a few winners and losers as I see them in my own day to day flight sim use. Once again, this is simply my opinion and what I have found to be categorized as winners and losers. I’d love to hear your own winners and losers and how/why they may or may not differ from mine. There are no right or wrong answers. Let’s get started!
The Winners
Fenix A320 Family
It should come as no surprise the top winner of 2025 would be the Fenix A320 Family of aircraft. Not only did Fenix work extremely hard to bring MSFS 2024 compatibility to their add-on in mere days of the MSFS 2024 release late last year, but this year they delivered their highly anticipated BFU update. As I discussed just a few weeks ago, the Fenix BFU along with their never ending support of their A320 family has crowned them the new King of 3rd party aircraft developers for our flight simulation hobby. Once held by PMDG for decades, the crown was ripped away and is firmly with Fenix and likely will remain there for some time.
MSFS 2024
I know Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 didn’t launch with a bang. It sort of sparked a bit and fizzled until SU3 was released late this summer. For those who frequently read my blog postings, you are aware that I didn’t even purchase the new sim until early this year. I spent a bit of time poking around and playing around with career mode and doing some GA flying. Then I embarked on my Around the World Adventure in mid August and spent more than two months flying exclusively in MSFS 2024 and fell in love with it. Early reports from SU4 beta testers were reporting that SU4 makes MSFS 2024 even better than it did with SU3 and now that SU4 is out, the hype was real. Moving to MSFS 2024 100% has been a long time coming for me and I know for many of you as well. With the launch of Chaseplane just before Christmas, the wait for me is over and I’m officially saying goodbye to my old friend MSFS 2020 and saying hello to 2024.
A2A Piper Comanche
I just love this GA aircraft and fell in love with it on day one which encouraged me to embark on my two month adventure as I flew it around the world in MSFS 2024. I’ve never been disappointed with any of the A2A aircraft purchases I’ve made in years past. While the Comanche remains my only A2A aircraft for MSFS 2020/2024, I’m sure it won’t be the last. Paired with MSFS 2024 (SU3) it truly made my Around the World Adventure a joy and kept me motivated to complete the trip.
Beyond ATC
Again, I didn’t purchase BeyondATC until this year. While it debuted mid last year, I really wanted to wait until it was baked a little more thorough before I pulled the trigger. Since owning it, a few updates have released which have made the quality of life better. I’m using it more and more on my tubeliner flights when not flying on the VATSIM network. Sometimes I even supplement VATSIM with BeyondATC during periods of no ATC availability. I’m looking forward to the future and what can be done to improve the experience with future updates.
GSX
The developers behind GSX have really done an outstanding job in bringing many game changing enhancements to GSX including integration into some of the airliners such as the Fenix A320 family. A few weeks ago they introduced new features including cleaning crews that will board your aircraft and tidy up after passengers trash the cabin. While I realize that some users have a love/hate relationship with GSX, it has truly worked flawlessly for me over the years and I use it on each and every flight. In the future I would love to see more cabin enhancements such as seeing passengers get up and walk to the toilets and perhaps even see cabin crew serve inflight refreshments up and down the aisles.
ChasePlane
While I was a little disappointed it took the guys at //42 so long to bring this solution to MSFS 2024, the wait is over and I’ve made the move to the new sim full-time. I completed my last MSFS 2020 flight on the morning of 19 December and around lunch, Chaseplane was available for 2024 and I quickly installed it. My first flight is currently underway as I’m flying from DFW to SEA in the new PMDG 737-800. Just like I missed not having Chaseplane for so long in MSFS 2020, once it was available it made life so much better in setting up cameras. I just simply can’t fly without it, especially in complex aircraft like the PMDG or Fenix.
Honorable Mention
Fly the Line – Short Haul Edition
While A Pilot’s Life still remains my favorite and number one career mode add-on, I felt Fly the Line was worthy of an honorable mention. Since it debuted earlier this year, a few updates have been released and it’s become a fairly solid career mode simulation. There are still some things I like about Fly The Line that doesn’t exist in A Pilot’s Life, but APL is what I find I use most.
Losers
Before I reveal the losers of 2025, let me say the following. I often start writing blog posts weeks in advance of when I intend to publish them. This piece is no exception. I began framing the article in late October with the intention of a mid to late December release date. While both PMDG and //42 released their highly anticipated add-ons being Chaseplane and the Boeing 737-800, only Chaseplane makes it out of the “losers” section into the “winners” section.
PMDG
Let me start off by saying, that I’m fully aware many simmers have been successful at getting the PMDG 737 somewhat operational in MSFS 2024. If you search hard enough you’ll find discussions with instructions on making a few changes in the 2020 version and it will work in 2024, sort of anyway. While I’ve done things in the past to make some add-ons work in different versions of what ever sim I had been using, but it’s not something I care to do at this stage of my life. At the end of the day I want a fully operational and fully supported version for the new sim and it seems like it has taken PMDG a very long time to deliver. While I’m happy to finally have the PMDG 737-800 available to me in MSFS 2024, I have placed PMDG in the losers section for the simple fact that from my own experience other third party aircraft developers which I rely on to provide me entertainment in the flight simulation hobby have delivered their products from MSFS 2020 to MSFS 2024 in a much more timely manner and didn’t charge extra for doing so. After all, I have purchased the PMDG 737-800 five times. The first being for FSX, then again for P3D, then once again for P3D v4 (64 bit), then MSFS 2020 and finally paid the update price for MSFS 2024. I simply don’t buy into the whole “the PMDG 737-800 for MSFS 2024 is a 100% complete rewrite”. Of course I believe they had to do some code changes to bring the 737-800 into MSFS 2024. After all, the extra flightdeck clutter and finally having a functional flightdeck door and openable window did require some code changes. But a complete, from the ground up rewrite? No, I don’t believe it. Was it worth the $30 I had to pay? Well….I did buy it day one and will enjoy it for countless hours, so I guess the answer is…..yes!
AivlaSoft EFB
While this news really broke last year in 2024, it wasn’t until earlier this year that I learned the developer of AivlaSoft EFB was shutting down sales and also ending any further development. In my opinion and I’m not alone, the AivlaSoft EFB which had been around for more than a decade was the absolute best external EFB software available for flight sim. I was first introduced to AivlaSoft EFB way back in FSX when it was still version 1. A new version, v2 was released sometime after and had been updated to work through all versions of P3D and MSFS 2020. When I began setting up MSFS 2024 I realized it wasn’t connecting. So I began researching to find out if I was missing an update or if there was a workaround. While I discovered a workaround thanks to a friend, I also learned the developer had called it quits in 2024. Now I don’t know all the circumstances behind the decision to cease operations, but whatever the situation is I’m disappointed to see such a wonderful product become end of life.
Third Party Developers and Our Community
I added this entry as sort of an after thought. Like many of the articles I write here, I read and make changes and sometimes do it all over again time and time again until I get it just right. While I placed MSFS 2024 in the winner section simply because I’ve enjoyed the time I’ve spent flying on that platform. But in reality, in a way it is also a loser in the sense that we were told in the months leading up to the release of MSFS 2024 that the majority of third party add-ons would be compatible with the new sim on day one with others only requiring small updates. At the same time I do understand the reasons some developers have decided to rework their add-ons to be more native to the new sim.
Looking Forward to 2026
Just some bonus commentary regarding what I’m looking forward to in the new year.
Bluebird 757
If you’re into airliner simulations then I’m sure you have been following the progress of the Bluebird Simulations 757. For me, I believe this will be a day one purchase as I love the 757 and have missed having a good 757. The last 757 we’ve had for flight sim was the QualityWings 757 and while it was really good in the FSX days, the quality of the aircraft deteriorated as it was ported over to P3D.
Fenix NEOs
Could we see the NEO variants for the Fenix A320 sometime early in the new year? I certainly hope so, but time will tell. While Fenix had intentions to release these in 2025, they did announce in late November that they would not release until 2026. With that said, once Fenix delivers everything for their A320 family, what other aircraft could we eventually see from the Fenix developers? Do you think they will introduce other aircraft to their fleet? Some are suggesting a possible A330 offering. For me personally, I would absolutely love it if they would create an A318. While I realize the A318 has been retired by most airlines who once relied on the type including British Airways, Frontier and Tarom. However, Air France still flies the type on some short-haul routes. Flight sim isn’t just about simulating the current state of aviation. Again, for me personally I would mostly use the A318 to simulate the historical flights between London City and JFK.
iniBuilds Dallas / Fort Worth International (DFW)
The news broke just before Christmas that iniBuilds have taken on the project of bringing their rendition of my favorite airport which is none other than Dallas / Fort Worth International Airport. This will be a day one purchase for me and hopefully we’ll see this early in the new year. DFW has been mostly ignored by 3rd party developers and even FSDreamTeam which had previously created versions for FSX/P3D hasn’t made any effort to bring DFW to MSFS. While Imaginsim released their version, I could tell from the screenshots that it was going to be a hard pass from me.
Well this wraps up my year in review for 2025. It’s been an awesome year for our hobby and I’m confident that 2026 will prove to be an even better year. I’d love to hear your highs and lows from 2025. So drop a comment and let me know.
Until next year…
Happy Flying!!!
Jerry