Abstract:Flight test is a key procedure in the industrial chain of civil aircraft. A long flight test cycle will cause delayed delivery of aircraft, loss of enterprise reputation, and delayed withdrawal of funds. Therefore, China’s civil aircraft flight test has a large space for improvement in economy, safety and other aspects. Virtual Flight Test (VFT) refers to the flight test process which contains one or more simulation links. VFT technology can be used to construct a new iterative model of flight test, which can be described as “predictiontestcomparison”. This new model can predict flight test results, evaluate task risk in advance, ensure safety, improve quality and reduce cost. This paper defined the concept of VFT. Through selecting ground flight test and airtoground integrated flight test as two typical VFT technologies, their technical concepts, application scopes, realization mechanisms, and application statuses were introduced in this paper. In view of the fact that airtoground integrated test flight is rarely applied in actual flight tests in China, a set of equipment demonstration scheme is proposed to evaluate the feasibility of introducing an airtoground integrated flight test platform in actual flight tests.