An instrument pilot who flies with a Jeppesen binder, filing each set of revision pages as it comes, has had the last of them. Jeppesen's paper charts ended this weekend. Jeppesen's general aviation notice says its chart printing services "have been terminated 31 October 2026", and every paper chart subscription still running ended on Nov. 1.
What Jeppesen says happens now
The notice, read today, gives these points for general aviation customers:
- Unused time is credited. A subscription paid past Nov. 1 gets a credit for the part that won't be delivered.
- Renewal invoices dated after Oct. 31 are canceled. Renewal notices go out by email 60 days before a subscription ends and show a full year, so an owner who got one this fall and hasn't paid it shouldn't.
- The digital route is ForeFlight. Jeppesen names ForeFlight on the Web for planning on the ground and ForeFlight Mobile for the ground and the air, and says its customer service has transition discounts. The notice gives no prices for them.
- Paper is still possible, one chart at a time. ForeFlight Mobile can print or export airport diagrams and approach charts, singly or in bulk. Jeppesen still sells its 7-hole punched paper, as "JeppView printer paper", on its online shop, so a binder can be kept with charts the pilot prints.
Customers in the Americas and Asia-Pacific are told to write to captain@jeppesen.com or use the contact form on Jeppesen's shop.
The notice gives no reason for the change and no date of its own. OPSGROUP, a flight operations group, reported in November 2025 that Jeppesen had announced the end in a service bulletin dated Sept. 5, 2025, so subscribers have had more than a year's notice.
Who owns Jeppesen now
Jeppesen and ForeFlight are one company. Boeing sold them, with other parts of its digital aviation business, to the private equity firm Thoma Bravo in an all-cash deal valued at $10.55 billion. The sale closed a year ago: Thoma Bravo's release of Nov. 3, 2025, announced the standalone company, Jeppesen ForeFlight, based in Denver and San Francisco, with Brad Surak, who had run Boeing's digital aviation business, as chief executive. The end of paper came under the new owner, and the place Jeppesen sends its paper customers is the app the same company sells.
What it changes for a pilot flying under part 91
A pilot who flies the FAA's own charts loses nothing here. The FAA's approach plates come out every 28 days in its free digital Terminal Procedures Publication. The pilots this touches are those who bought Jeppesen's charts and kept them on paper.
Nothing in part 91 requires paper. The FAA's AC 91-78A, Use of Electronic Flight Bags (Feb. 23, 2024), says an EFB can be used in every phase of flight in place of paper reference material, and that using one in flight is the decision of the operator and the pilot in command, with no formal operational approval needed so long as the AC's guidelines are followed. Its conditions, in paragraph 9.1, are that the EFB doesn't replace any equipment part 91 requires, shows only what's functionally equivalent to the paper it replaces, and that the information is "current, up to date, and valid, as verified by the pilot". The AC isn't a regulation; it is the FAA's accepted means.
The rule underneath is 14 CFR 91.103: before a flight, the pilot in command has to become familiar with all available information concerning it. For an IFR flight that means current charts in some form.
What to check
- A paper binder that stayed in the airplane is now out of date. Jeppesen sends no more revisions, so its charts stop being current as the cycles turn. A pilot who keeps the binder as a backup is keeping old charts.
- Printed charts are only as current as the day they were printed. A pilot who prints approaches for a trip has to print them again when the cycle changes, every 28 days for the FAA's plates.
- An EFB as the only chart needs a plan for when it fails. AC 91-78A paragraph 11.1 tells the operator to assess workload, display and lighting, system shutdown and failures, and where the device sits for takeoff and landing. A second device, or the panel's own charts where an EFIS carries them, is the common answer; the AC doesn't name one.
- A pilot with credit coming should ask for it. The notice says the credit is issued; it doesn't say whether it comes as a refund or toward a ForeFlight subscription.
Sources: Jeppesen, General aviation: Jeppesen paper chart services phase-out, and Business aviation: Jeppesen paper chart services phase-out, read Nov. 3, 2026; Thoma Bravo, Jeppesen ForeFlight launches as a standalone company, Nov. 3, 2025; OPSGROUP, Farewell, Paper Jepps, Nov. 4, 2025; FAA, AC 91-78A, Use of Electronic Flight Bags, Feb. 23, 2024; 14 CFR 91.103, Preflight action; FAA, Digital Terminal Procedures Publication, all read Nov. 3, 2026.
Photo: Electronic Flight Bag by UA535, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.