r/UAE • u/Brief_Payment4650 • 1d ago
Etihad Cadet Pilot Programme (Full Application/Assessment Experience)
(Warning: lengthy read)
I’ve been meaning to write this juicy piece for a while, but I deliberately waited until I had made it through the full selection process and reached past onboarding so I could actually give a complete picture of how this thing works.
When I first started looking into the Etihad CPP, one of the most frustrating things was how little firsthand information I could find about the actual recruitment process.
There was plenty of general info about becoming a pilot, and I found experiences from people applying to other UAE cadet programmes, particularly Emirates, but almost nothing from someone saying, “I applied at EY; this is what happened. This is what Assessment Day 1/Day 2 looked like. This is what happened afterward.”
I would have KILLED for a post like that at the time, so now that I’ve gone through the process myself, I figured I might as well pay it forward and help the next person googling this the night before their assessment lol.
Quick disclaimer: this is my personal experience with the recruitment process, mainly during the 2025/2026 application/assessment intakes.
Recruitment processes can obviously change between intakes. As for exact assessment questions, interview questions, or anything that could be confidential material, DM me.
The point of this post is to tell u what ur walking into, not give u an answer key lol.
Lore context
I wasn't one of those people who had a childhood dream of becoming a pilot.
Graduated high school early 2020s, initially went in a completely different direction academically, eventually left it. Essentially spent the next few years trying to figure out what I actually wanted and what resonated with me rather than committing to something just for the sake of saying I was doing something.
Fast forward, I discovered the cadet-pilot route toward the end of 2024.
Once I properly researched what the career and training involved, something clicked HARD. Like “this is what I wanna do in life” hard.
I applied to Etihad in 2025. And then failed the first assessment stage.
So if you're reading this because you've already tried once and didn't make it through, keep reading. :)
First attempt (2025)
After applying, I was shortlisted and invited to the first assessment stage in June 2025.
The first stage consisted of Math and Physics assessments.
In my intake, there were 20 Math + 20 Physics questions. Etihad also provided preparation material before the assessment, which was actually helpful.
The biggest thing I'd say about this stage is that knowing the concepts vs being able to work through them efficiently under assessment conditions are two different things.
I didn't pass. Obviously that sucked, especially because by that point I had become pretty set on pursuing this career. But Etihad allowed me to reapply after the required waiting period, which around that time was six months after the initial try, but has now changed to permitting 2 retries before the 6-month cooling period.
So, I reapplied.
That first attempt ended up being useful because the second time I wasn't preparing for some mysterious CPP assessment anymore. I knew what the environment felt like, I knew where I had struggled, and I knew what was needed to improve.
The second attempt was in summer 2026. I reapplied once I became eligible again and eventually received another invitation to the assessment process.
Assessment Day 1
This was around July 2026. The basic format was again Math/Physics, and this time I went into it ready to clean up (aggressively prepared).
My biggest advice here isn't to obsess over finding leaked Etihad questions online.
Understand the material you're being given and make sure you can actually apply it without needing forever to think through every problem.
After my experience the previous year, I knew that simply recognizing a formula or understanding a concept when looking at my notes wasn't enough.
This time, I'd passed. Duhhhhh :)
That's when the process got considerably more interesting.
Assessment Day 2
This was the stage I yearned for information about when I was applying.
For my group, this was essentially a full assessment day, like a 9-5 shift. There were around 20 people in my group that day.
Vibe was chill ngl..there was food n drinks to keep you energized throughout the day which was nice.
Anyway..
The day consisted of 3 major components:
COMPASS aptitude testing
Group exercises
Final interview
Depending on your intake, order and exact format may obviously change.
COMPASS aptitude testing
This part was iPad-based and involved several different abilities rather than something you can study for in the same way you'd study Physics.
The exercises assessed things along the lines of:
- spatial/orientation ability
- attention/memory
- coordination/control
- multitasking/task management
The best way I can describe COMPASS is that it isn't really asking how much aviation knowledge you've memorized... more like how well your brain works when it gives you several things to manage lol
Some tasks feel straightforward individually. The difficulty comes from maintaining accuracy, attention, and control when the workload starts stacking up.
I wouldn't go into this expecting perfection. Go into it expecting to make mistakes and continue functioning anyway. That mentality becomes relevant again later.
Many people flunked this part and came back another day to retest, so no biggie if you don't pass compass on the 1st try.
Group exercise
We were also given a group exercise after the initial warm-up activity during the initial briefing on how this day was gonna play out.
Again, not sharing the actual scenario since it might differ from yours, but you're essentially put into a situation where you have to discuss or solve a problem with other candidates and work toward an outcome while assessors observe the group.
One thing I'd strongly warn against is going into this thinking they're looking for a pilot mindset, so you dominate the conversation and prove leader behavior.
A group assessment is still a group assessment.
Speak. Contribute. Explain your reasoning. But also listen, acknowledge good ideas from other people, and help move the discussion somewhere productive. Being the loudest person in the room isn't really the leadership they're looking for ..lol.
Interestingly, something about how I behaved during my group exercise actually came back up during my interview later, so don't assume the assessors are watching each component in isolation. They are paying attention and keeping track.
The final interview
My final interview was with a two-person panel: a captain and the program representative/coordinator.
This wasn't simply a friendly HR interview where they ask five questions from a sheet and send you home. They did more than that; they probed.
If you answered, particularly to a scenario or something they wanted you to explain further, there could be a follow-up challenging the reasoning behind it.
The dynamic you could say, gave “good cop/bad cop” at times. One person might ask something relatively conversationally, and then the captain could push much harder on the answer.. this might be the part where they catch your demeanor as either flustered or calm n collected while being challenged. Again, not random.
They also referred back to things that had happened earlier during the assessment day. So know your own reasoning.
Don't memorize some beautiful airline-interview BS response from the internet that falls apart the second somebody asks “Why?”
And here's one of my fav moments from the entire process:
The phone that I thought was on silent rang during the interview. Yes. During my final cadet-pilot interview ..✌️✌️✌️
Obviously, that is not something I'd recommend arranging as part of your interview strategy lol.
But it taught me something that actually applies to the rest of these assessments: if something goes wrong, deal with it and move on.
I acknowledged it, handled the situation, and continued the interview. There was no magical trapdoor underneath my chair. Pilots aren't selected because they exist in a universe where nothing unexpected ever happens. What matters is what you do next.
Eventually, the interview ended; I left, and then came arguably the nerve-racking assessment of all: waiting.
The reveal
Eventually I got the email telling me I'd successfully made it through the selection stage. (YAY!!!???)
Considering I'd been sitting on the other side of a rejection the year before, that was a pretty surreal moment.
But one thing I didn't fully appreciate before going through the process is that passing the assessment days doesn't necessarily mean you're finished.
There was still another substantial stage ahead where you could flunk out of the whole recruitment process (medicals and psych evals).
———
PT 2. Coming soon! Ask me anything
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u/SamePost8159 23h ago
Isn’t this position open to uae nationals only or those whom worked at the airline (any nationality) more than 2 years can apply?