The forum discussion centers on a familiar and consequential question for pilots transitioning from Part 91/135 flying into the airline world: whether completing the FAA-mandated ATP Certification Training Program (ATP CTP) and written exam alone is sufficient to signal readiness to airlines, or whether a pilot should go further and complete the full ATP practical test (checkride) before applying. The poster, a King Air captain with roughly 2,000 total hours, over 1,100 turbine PIC hours, and substantial multi-engine time, sits right at the regulatory threshold for R-ATP eligibility and is weighing how to position himself for competitive programs like NetJets and ULCCs such as Frontier. His question reflects a broader uncertainty in the pilot community about which credential carries more weight with hiring departments—especially fractional operators and low-cost carriers that have historically been more flexible on flight-time minimums than legacy majors.
The ATP CTP, mandated under the 2013 Airline Safety and Federal Aviation Administration Extension Act (the "1,500-hour rule" born out of the Colgan Air 3407 accident), requires 30 hours of academic instruction plus simulator training in a Level C or D FFS representing a multi-engine turbine airplane over 40,000 lbs with a two-pilot crew. Completing the CTP and passing the written exam produces a certificate of completion that is valid for 24 months and is a prerequisite for sitting the actual ATP checkride, but it does not itself confer the ATP certificate. Many pilots complete only the CTP/written combination early in their timeline specifically because airlines like NetJets, ExpressJet-successors, and several regionals have accepted that documentation as sufficient evidence of readiness during the interview and conditional-offer stage, with the full practical test often completed later during type-rating training at the airline itself, frequently in the same simulator session as initial operating experience. This has become standard practice because many Part 121 carriers administer the ATP checkride as part of new-hire indoc, folding the cost and logistics into their own training pipeline rather than requiring candidates to arrive with a standalone ATP certificate already in hand.
For working pilots, this matters because timing and cost efficiency are real considerations. An ATP practical test taken independently, outside of a type-specific 121 training program, can run several thousand dollars and typically requires renting a suitable simulator, since most non-airline pilots do not have routine access to Part 121-caliber turbine simulators outside of CTP providers or contract training centers like ATP Flight School's affiliated program. If a hiring airline is simply going to administer its own ATP ride tied to the airplane type it operates, spending additional money on a generic ATP checkride in a different aircraft before ever applying may be redundant. That said, some candidates believe holding a completed ATP certificate demonstrates a stronger commitment and reduces training risk in the eyes of recruiters, particularly at operators like NetJets that hire pilots directly onto varied fleet types and may value a pilot who arrives already ATP-certificated rather than one who will need it built into initial training.
This debate is emblematic of a larger trend across the industry: the credentialing pathway into commercial aviation has become increasingly modular, with cadet programs, CTP providers, and airlines themselves dividing up pieces of training that used to be bundled together. As regional carriers continue to face pilot shortages while majors and fractional operators enjoy deeper applicant pools, competitive differentiation among non-cadet, "typical dude" applicants increasingly comes down to marginal signals—turbine PIC time, multi-engine hours, and now which training milestones have been completed ahead of application. Pilots building time in King Airs, Citations, and similar Part 91/135 turbine equipment are well positioned under current R-ATP and experience thresholds, but the CTP-versus-full-ATP decision underscores how much informal, crowd-sourced knowledge from forums like r/flying has become a de facto guide for career progression, filling gaps left by inconsistent messaging from airlines themselves about what documentation actually moves an application forward.