Global Jet Capital Forecasts $247 Billion in Business Jet Transactions Through 2030
Why It MattersThe forecast points to heavy jets and pre-owned aircraft as the segments driving growth, underscoring how buyer preference for range and capacity continues to reshape demand across regions.
What happened
Global Jet Capital has released its sixth annual Business Jet Market Forecast, projecting $247 billion in total transaction volume for new and pre-owned business aircraft between 2026 and 2030. The company projects this volume will grow at an average annualized rate of 4.1 percent over that period, using its proprietary econometric top-down transaction forecast model, which covers deliveries and pre-owned transactions across all jet size categories through 2030.
Global Jet Capital cites increasing order backlogs, resilient economic growth, and continued wealth creation as the primary drivers of sustained industry expansion. Within that overall growth, heavy jets are expected to outpace other segments, driven by buyer preference for greater range and capacity: the report anticipates transaction volume growth of 3.3 percent for new heavy jets and 4.9 percent for pre-owned heavy jets. New medium jets and pre-owned very light jets (VLJs) are also projected to grow at above-average rates.
Geographically, North America is expected to remain the largest business jet market over the next five years. Latin America is anticipated to rank as the second-largest market, driven by high demand for pre-owned aircraft, while Europe is forecast to remain a significant market for new jet deliveries.
Industry impact & what to watch
Annual market forecasts like this one function as a shared reference point for how OEMs, lenders and brokers plan capacity, financing and inventory across a five-year horizon rather than a single sales cycle. When a forecast breaks out growth by size category and by new versus pre-owned status, it signals where order backlogs and residual values are likely to hold up best, which in turn shapes how financiers like Global Jet Capital itself price and structure future transactions.
The segment-level detail here — heavy jets outpacing other categories, pre-owned heavy jets growing faster than new heavy jets, and Latin America's demand concentrated in pre-owned aircraft — reflects how the business jet market typically splits between buyers chasing range and cabin capacity and buyers prioritizing acquisition cost. Regional demand patterns tend to follow wealth creation and economic growth rates rather than moving uniformly worldwide, which is why North America, Latin America and Europe are each expected to play a different role in the total volume.
What remains to be seen is how closely actual order backlogs and delivery counts over the next several years track this projection, since a top-down econometric model rests on assumptions about economic growth and wealth creation that can shift before 2030.
