Cross-country time sounds like it should be the simplest column in a logbook: you flew somewhere and came back. In practice it is one of the most misunderstood, because what counts depends on why you are counting it, and because the FAA and EASA define it in genuinely different ways. Getting it right is worth the effort, since this column feeds straight into the experience you need for licences and ratings.
This is general educational information, not operational, legal, or regulatory advice. Rules differ by authority and change over time. Always verify against current official sources and follow your operator's approved procedures.
What cross-country actually means
At its heart, cross-country flying is navigating from one place to another rather than staying local. ICAO Annex 1 frames it, much as EASA does, as a planned flight between a point of departure and a point of arrival, and each authority then writes the detail. The trap is that "the detail" is not a single number; it is several, and which one applies depends on what the time is for.
The reason the rule matters is that the cross-country column is experience you bank. Licences and ratings demand minimum cross-country hours and qualifying flights, and an examiner reviewing your logbook is checking that the entries actually meet the definition for the certificate you are applying for. Log it loosely and you risk a flight that does not count when you need it to; understand the definitions and the entry stands up.
The FAA: a broad definition and a stricter one
The United States, in 14 CFR 61.1, actually carries two cross-country definitions, and confusing them is the classic mistake.
The broad logging definition is the one most flights meet. Cross-country time is time acquired during a flight that includes a point of landing at a position other than the point of departure and that involves navigating to that landing point by pilotage, dead reckoning, radio aids or other navigation systems. There is no minimum distance. A 20-mile hop to the next field and a full-stop landing is cross-country under this definition, and it is the definition you use for general logging and for things like a flight review.
The stricter definition applies when you are counting the time toward specific certificates and ratings. To meet the aeronautical experience requirements for a private or commercial pilot certificate, or an instrument rating, the flight must include a point of landing at least a straight-line distance of more than 50 nautical miles from the original point of departure. For a sport pilot the threshold is more than 25 nautical miles, and for the ATP certificate the cross-country involves a point more than 50 nautical miles from departure but, unusually, does not require a landing there. So the 50-mile figure that everyone quotes is real, but it is conditional: it gates the rating experience, not every logbook entry.
The aeronautical-experience rules then add their own qualifying flights. For the private certificate, 14 CFR 61.109 requires, among other things, a long solo cross-country of at least 150 nautical miles total, with full-stop landings at three points and one segment of more than 50 nautical miles straight-line distance. The threshold and the qualifier work together.
EASA: a distance-free definition
EASA takes a cleaner route. FCL.010 defines cross-country as simply a flight between a point of departure and a point of arrival following a pre-planned route, using standard navigation procedures. There is no distance and no landing requirement in the definition itself. A planned navigation flight is cross-country; a few circuits are not.
Where the FAA puts distances in the definition, EASA puts them in the experience requirements for each licence. The private pilot licence requires a qualifying cross-country flight of at least 270 km (150 nautical miles), during which full-stop landings at two aerodromes different from the departure aerodrome are made, set out in FCL.210.A. The commercial pilot licence training includes a longer VFR cross-country of at least 300 nautical miles (540 km) with full-stop landings at two aerodromes different from the departure. So the distances exist, but they live in the licence rules, not the word "cross-country".
The rest of the definition: navigation and the landing
Distance is only half of the FAA cross-country definition, and the half people forget is the navigation. The flight has to involve navigating to the landing point by pilotage, dead reckoning, radio aids, electronic navigation or other systems. A flight that simply pottered about the local area, or covered a long total distance without actually navigating a planned route to somewhere else, is not cross-country, however many miles went on the clock. EASA's definition makes the same point from the other direction: a pre-planned route using standard navigation procedures is the essence of it. The reason is that the experience the requirement is really after is the skill of planning and flying a route, the airspace, the fuel, the diversions and the decisions, not the bare fact of having travelled.
The landing carries its own subtlety. The broad logging definition needs a point of landing at a position other than the departure point, and the named qualifying flights go further and specify full-stop landings at a set number of aerodromes: two aerodromes different from the departure for the EASA private-licence qualifier, three points for the FAA long cross-country. That matters because a touch-and-go at a distant field does not satisfy a full-stop requirement, so a flight that would otherwise tick the distance box can still fall short of a qualifying flight if the landing was not a full stop. When you are flying a specific qualifier, read exactly what kind of landing, and how many, the rule asks for.
Put the two halves together and cross-country has three ingredients to check: you navigated a planned route, you landed in the way the rule requires, and, where the rule sets one, you met the distance. Miss any one and the entry may not count for the purpose you intended.
A worked example
You fly from airport A, land at airport B, then return to A. Airport B is a straight-line 60 nautical miles from A.
Under the FAA, this is cross-country for general logging, because there is a landing away from the departure point. It also counts toward your private, commercial or instrument experience, because the landing at B is more than 50 nautical miles from A. The entry is good for both purposes.
Now move airport B closer, to a straight-line 40 nautical miles from A. The flight is still cross-country for general logging under the broad definition. But it no longer counts toward the private, commercial or instrument experience, because no landing is more than 50 nautical miles from the departure point. The flight did not change; the purpose you are logging it for did.
Under EASA, the same 40-mile or 60-mile flight is cross-country either way, because the definition has no distance. The separate question is whether it helps toward the PPL qualifying cross-country, and that needs the 270 km total with full-stop landings at two aerodromes other than the departure, which a simple A-to-B-and-back does not satisfy regardless of how far B is. Same flights, two systems, and the thing you have to check is different in each.
Common pitfalls
- Treating 50 nautical miles as the universal definition. Under the FAA it gates certificate and rating experience, not general logging, and it is 25 nautical miles for sport pilots.
- Carrying the FAA distance into an EASA logbook. EASA's definition has no distance; the distances are in the licence requirements instead.
- Measuring distance from the wrong point. The FAA threshold is a straight-line distance from the original point of departure, not from one leg to the next.
- Assuming a flight that counts for one purpose counts for all. A short hop can be cross-country for a flight review yet not for an instrument rating.
- Forgetting the full-stop landings. The EASA qualifying flights, and the FAA long cross-country, specify full-stop landings at named numbers of aerodromes, not just overflights.
In Pilot EFB
Pilot EFB keeps a cross-country column in its electronic logbook alongside your other totals, and completing a flight can generate an entry for you to review and confirm rather than retype. It is a convenient personal record, not a compliance system: you confirm which definition applies to what you are claiming, and reconcile the entry with the rule for your licence and with any logbook your training organisation or operator treats as the official record. Saved entries stay available offline. Pilot EFB is offline-first and is not a certified or authority-approved electronic logbook.