FAA Pilot Logbook & Currency Tracker
§61.57 day and night recency, instrument currency, and the grace period nobody remembers correctly — worked out from the flights you already logged.
The §61.57 rules, tracked automatically.
Every result cites the paragraph behind it. Nothing is a black box.
Day passenger currency
3 takeoffs and landings in the preceding 90 days, in the same category and class. Counted per category and class, so being current in a single-engine land aeroplane never quietly marks you current in anything else.
Night passenger currency
3 takeoffs and landings to a full stop in the preceding 90 days. Tracked separately from day currency, because the two lapse independently and usually do.
Instrument currency
6 instrument approaches plus holding procedures and course intercepting/tracking within the preceding 6 calendar months, with approaches counted as you log them.
The instrument grace period, handled properly.
Instrument currency does not simply switch off at six months, and this is where a lot of pilots — and a lot of software — get it wrong. There are three distinct states, and NinerLog reports which one you are in:
- Current. The required approaches, holding and tracking are inside the preceding 6 calendar months.
- Lapsed, but recoverable. Past 6 months and within 12, you can regain currency by flying the required experience with a safety pilot — no instructor sign-off needed.
- Expired. Past 12 months without the required experience, an Instrument Proficiency Check is the only way back, per §61.57(d).
Being told “not current” is not much use on its own. Being told which of those three you are in tells you whether to book an aircraft or book an examiner.
The flight review you will otherwise forget.
§61.56 is the requirement that catches people out, because 24 calendar months is long enough to stop thinking about it. Mark a flight as a flight review when you log it and NinerLog tracks the expiry from there, showing you the date it runs out and emailing you before it does.
The same goes for an IPC or a proficiency check — flag the flight once, and it feeds the currency picture instead of living in your memory.
Gliders count launches.
In a glider a flight is one launch and one landing, and the launch is the number that matters. NinerLog has a dedicated glider path for §61.57(a) rather than forcing sailplane flying through an aeroplane-shaped rule — a detail most logbook apps skip entirely.
If you fly both sides of the Atlantic, the same flights also feed the EASA sailplane rules under FCL.140.S. One logbook, each authority evaluated on its own terms. See the EASA side →
An honest note about compliance.
Currency results are decision support, not authority. Regulations change and the FAA has the final word — the pilot in command remains responsible for their own currency. The engine is open source, so you can read exactly how each rule is applied.
Already have hours somewhere else?
NinerLog reads ForeFlight logbook CSV exports and recognises the column layout on its own. Any other CSV can be mapped column by column. Currency is calculated from the imported history, so you are not starting from zero.
How import & export works →Know where you stand before you preflight.
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