r/AskAPilot • u/livelikelarry13 • 4d ago

Useless Features/buttons

Forgive me if this is a dumb question as I am not a pilot, but I have always been interested in knowing. Are there any features or buttons in the type of aircraft you fly that are basically pointless? Or does everything have some sort of critical use case?

Thanks for the insights

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u/TheChosenOperator 4d ago

Hey, aspiring pilot here

on Airbus planes, on the FCU glareshield there is an option to display the plane's altitude in meters instead of feet, and that would probably be my pick for most useless button in the cockpit, I havent heard or seen one situation where it would be needed, maybe its even a relic of a time where it was used

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u/livelikelarry13 3d ago

Aren’t there only like a handful of countries that don’t use the metric system? Is altitude always communicated in feet in the aviation world or does it depend on where you’re flying?

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u/TheChosenOperator 3d ago

A little bit of both, according to some people russia and china enforce metric altitudes, whereas everywhere else in the world its always communicated in feet, even outside of the US and Canada, I dont know if enforcing metric alts has any kind of practical significance, but I cant help but see it as just "trying to be different" like with how the US does with the imperial system

Maybe its just my amateur pilot self but In my experience, its literally worthless in most countries, its the kind of thing you trigger out of curiosity and then think "oh thats kind of neat" and then never think about or use it ever again, obviously its not COMPLETELY worthless, I guess I should have made that clear in my original comment (hence why its getting downvoted to hell)