Q2 2026 Business Jet Market: Heavy Segment Tightens as Inventory Falls 20.9%, Transactions Rise 18.5%
Why It MattersGrowing OEM backlogs are steering buyers toward preowned inventory across most segments, but the medium-jet market shows tight supply can still coexist with falling asking prices when demand softens unevenly.
What happened
Business jet market data through the second quarter of 2026 show a tight seller's market in the heavy-jet segment. Only 5.2% of the heavy-jet fleet is listed for sale, well below the 10-year average of 7.0%; inventory is down 20.9% year-over-year and transactions are up 18.5% through the first half of 2026.
Other segments show mixed conditions. Super-mid jets have 6.6% of the fleet listed versus a 6.7% long-run average, described as essentially in balance, with no specific inventory or transaction-change figures attached to that segment. Medium jets have 7.3% of the fleet listed against an 8.6% average, with inventory down 4.1% year-over-year and transactions up 1.0% through H1 2026 — yet asking prices have fallen roughly 25% year-over-year. A separate figure, not attributed to a named segment, shows inventory down 7.7% year-over-year and transactions up 4.4% through H1 2026.
OEM order backlogs are cited alongside these figures. Bombardier's backlog has grown 51% since year-end 2024, Gulfstream's is up 22%, and Embraer's is up 5%. Textron Aviation's backlog dipped in 2025 before recovering this quarter. Effective January 2026, Textron eliminated its eAviation segment, which had generated roughly $30 million per year in revenue, folding most of it into Textron Aviation, so the current-quarter Textron Aviation figure is not on a strictly identical segment basis as prior periods. Backlog unit figures are FLYING Finance's estimates.
Transaction counts by segment, using FY2023 as a base, show further detail. Heavy jet transactions moved from 539 in FY2023 to 625 (+16.0%) in FY2024 and 699 (+11.8%) in FY2025. Super-mid jet transactions rose from 287 to 313 (+9.0%) and then 344 (+9.9%). Medium jet transactions fell from 728 to 670 (-8.0%) before rising to 747 (+11.5%). Light jet transactions moved from 1,053 to 990 (-6.0%) and then 1,064 (+7.5%). Turboprop transactions went from 1,302 to 1,289 (-1.0%) and then 1,326 (+2.9%).
Industry impact & what to watch
This pattern reflects how a seller's market forms when growing OEM backlogs extend new-aircraft wait times, pushing buyers toward preowned inventory and tightening it further — the dynamic visible most clearly in heavy jets, where falling inventory and rising transactions move together. Backlog growth at Bombardier, Gulfstream and Embraer reinforces that read across most segments, since longer waits for new deliveries typically sustain demand for used aircraft already available.
The medium-jet segment breaks that pattern. Inventory is down and transactions are up, mirroring the heavy-jet story, yet asking prices have fallen roughly 25% year-over-year — a split the data present as an anomaly rather than something the tight-supply narrative explains on its own. That divergence signals that inventory tightness alone does not guarantee pricing power in every segment; buyer composition, aircraft age mix, or seller urgency can move prices independently of headline listing rates.
Textron's segment restructuring is worth tracking separately, since folding the roughly $30-million-a-year eAviation business into Textron Aviation from January 2026 means the current quarter's backlog figure cannot be compared cleanly against prior periods. Whether Textron's backlog recovery holds once a like-for-like basis is re-established, and whether medium-jet pricing stabilizes or continues to diverge from its inventory trend, are the two threads this data leaves unresolved.
