Becoming a flight attendant: requirements, training and working hours

Most of the time you only know the cabin from the outside: as a row of small windows on an Airbus rolling past your spot. Inside work the people who are responsible for safety on board at every takeoff and landing. Becoming a flight attendant is, for many aviation fans, the most direct way to make aviation their job – without years of pilot training. This guide shows you which requirements airlines expect, how training under EU law works, what the cabin crew attestation is and what working hours and daily life in the cabin look like.

Becoming a flight attendant: the short answer

To work as a flight attendant in Europe, you need passed initial training under the EU rules in Part-CC, the resulting cabin crew attestation and a valid aeromedical assessment. You usually get the training directly from the airline that hires you. After that come familiarization with that airline’s aircraft types and procedures as well as the first flights under supervision.

There is no state-recognized apprenticeship profession “flight attendant” in Germany. If you want to qualify further later, you can do an advancement course with a chamber of commerce (IHK) exam, for example as a Fachberater für Servicemanagement (service management specialist).

What flight attendants really do

Service is the visible part – the reason flight attendants exist is safety. Before every flight the crew checks emergency equipment, fire extinguishers, oxygen bottles and first aid supplies. During boarding they make sure luggage is stowed securely and emergency exit rows are occupied correctly. Before takeoff come the safety demonstration and the cabin check: belts fastened, aisles clear, seat backs upright. Why the window shades are also opened for this is explained in the article Window shades during takeoff and landing.

In the air it’s about service, but also about vigilance: smoke in a lavatory, a medical emergency, a passenger who doesn’t follow the rules. In turbulence the crew secures trolleys and cabin, and for questions about cabin pressure and pressure in your ears or about cabin air they are often the first point of contact. And for people with a fear of flying, a relaxed crew calms more than any statistic.

After landing things move on quickly: assisting disembarkation, checking the cabin, often already preparing the next boarding. What happens around the aircraft in that time is described in the article Turnaround: how handling works.

Requirements: what airlines expect

The legal minimum requirement is manageable: you have to pass initial training and be medically fit to fly. Beyond that, each airline sets its own criteria. Typical ones are:

Criterion	What is usually required	Why
Age	of legal age	Responsibility for safety on board
School qualification	intermediate school certificate or higher	Theory, exams, communication
Languages	very good German and English	Announcements, crew communication, passengers
Swimming	be able to swim confidently	Training for ditching and life rafts
Height	minimum height or reach height	Access to emergency equipment in overhead bins
Health	aeromedical fitness	Pressure changes, shift work, emergency procedures
Reliability	check under aviation security law	Access to the security area

The exact values – for example for height or reach height – differ from airline to airline and change occasionally. Only the current job ads are reliable. In Germany, a reliability check is required for access to the airside; what the Luftsicherheitsgesetz (German Aviation Security Act) regulates here is in the article German Aviation Security Act explained simply.

At least as important are the soft factors: friendliness even when the fifth passenger asks the same question, calm in exceptional situations, team spirit with colleagues you often only meet at the briefing, and a willingness to work irregular hours.

Application and selection process

Most airlines hire flight attendants in waves, often tied to a particular base. After the online application, a selection day with several components usually follows. What exactly is tested varies; often it is:

The training: initial training under Part-CC

In the EU, Regulation (EU) No 1178/2011 regulates in its Part-CC section how cabin crew are trained and certified. Initial training is deliberately general and not tied to a particular airline. According to EASA, it includes, for example, practical training with life rafts, even if the airline’s later aircraft don’t carry any on board.

Typical content of initial training:

• Emergency procedures and evacuation: operating doors, deploying escape slides, getting passengers out of the aircraft in a short time – practiced in the cabin trainer.
• Fire and smoke fighting: recognizing fire, using extinguishers, using breathing protection.
• First aid and medical emergencies: resuscitation, defibrillator, handling typical emergencies on board.
• Aviation knowledge and law: basics of flying, pressurized cabin, oxygen supply, powers of the crew.
• Teamwork: crew resource management – communication between cabin and cockpit, decisions under pressure. How important that is is shown by the history of aviation, for example after the Tenerife disaster of 1977.
• Aviation security: handling suspicious items and conspicuous passengers.

After passing the exam you receive the cabin crew attestation (CCA). According to EASA, it is issued without an expiry date and recognized throughout the EU. To be allowed to use it, though, you must keep meeting the conditions: valid medical fitness and up-to-date training.

After the attestation: type and airline training

The attestation alone doesn’t yet allow you to work on board. Next come the training on the aircraft type – every cabin has different doors, different emergency equipment, different positions – and the familiarization with the airline’s procedures. Whether you’re assigned to an Airbus A320neo on short-haul or an Airbus A350-900 on long-haul makes a big difference for door operation and evacuation routes. After that you fly a few rotations under the supervision of experienced colleagues.

Recurrent training is also mandatory: emergency procedures are refreshed and checked regularly. If you haven’t flown for a longer time, you need a refresher before returning.

Working hours and roster

Working time in the cabin doesn’t follow the rhythm of an office job. The basis is rosters, which the airline usually creates month by month. A duty starts with the briefing before the flight and ends only after landing and the closing tasks. On short-haul you often fly several sectors a day and return to base in the evening, on long-haul overnight stays at the destination follow.

For flight crews in commercial aviation, the flight time limitations of Regulation (EU) No 83/2014 apply in the EU. They set maximum limits for flight duty periods and duty hours over several periods, prescribe minimum rest periods and oblige airlines to take fatigue into account systematically. Collective agreements and works agreements often regulate additional details, such as days off per month or part-time models.

What that means concretely:

• Early and late duties: The first departure in the morning often means a briefing before sunrise. In the evening the last rotations land late.
• No entitlement to free weekends: School vacations, holidays and weekends are peak travel times.
• Reserve and standby: Some days you spend on standby and step in when a colleague drops out.
• Time zones: On long-haul, jet lag is part of the job. How long some rotations get is shown in the article on ultra-long-haul flights.
• Part-time: Many large airlines offer part-time models, and the details differ widely.

Where you can apply

In German-speaking countries many airlines hire cabin crew – network airlines, leisure airlines and low-cost carriers. They include Lufthansa and the other operating airlines of the Lufthansa Group such as Eurowings, Discover Airlines, Swiss and Austrian Airlines, leisure airlines such as Condor, TUIfly or Edelweiss. Who is hiring right now and at which base changes constantly – look directly at the careers pages (as of October 2026).

The choice of airline shapes your daily life more than much else: network airlines with long-haul mean hotel nights in faraway cities and large cabins with many colleagues, leisure airlines mean seasonal peaks in summer, short-haul operations mean many landings a day and usually going home after work.

Career in the cabin

With experience, paths upward open up. The classic step is to senior flight attendant – called purser, chef de cabine or senior cabin crew member at airlines. They bear responsibility to the captain for safety and emergency procedures in the cabin and are the interface to the cockpit. On large jets such as the Airbus A380, they are often supported by further colleagues who lead a cabin section or a class.

Other paths lead into training new crews, into operations planning or into ground functions. Some also use the cabin as a stepping stone: if you’ve caught the bug, take a look at the routes into the cockpit. And if you’d rather stay on the ground, the airport offers more careers, for example as an air traffic controller, aviation security assistant, in apron control or at the airport fire department.

A look back

The profession is almost as old as passenger aviation. The first flight attendant is considered to be the US nurse Ellen Church, who went on board at Boeing Air Transport in 1930 – the idea was to give anxious passengers a sense of security. In Germany, a flight steward already flew on Deutsche Luft Hansa from 1928, initially on the Berlin–Paris route. If you want to experience airliners from the inside, you’ll find walk-through aircraft in museums such as the Technik Museum Speyer.

A spotter’s view: recognizing cabin crews at the airport

As a spotter you see cabin crews more often than you think: walking across the apron, in the crew bus or at the door when the stairs are in place during a turnaround. At big hubs such as Frankfurt Airport or Munich Airport, operations around departures are easy to watch, for example from the Zeppelinheim viewing platform or the Munich Airport visitors’ hill (Besucherhügel).

And if you collect souvenirs from the cabin, you may already know safety cards and airline collectibles – the cards that flight attendants explain before every takeoff.

What to watch out for

• Choose reputable training providers. Private courses sometimes promise a job. Check whether the provider is an approved organization for initial training – and whether airlines will hire you afterward without their own training at all.
• Read the contract carefully. Fixed term, base, pay during training and repayment clauses for leaving early differ widely.
• Take your health seriously. The aeromedical assessment is repeated regularly. A cold with blocked ears is no minor matter in the cabin but a reason not to fly.
• Plan your private life. Shift work and changing rosters require arrangements with family and friends.
• Consider the base. Ideally you live near your base, because duties often start early in the morning.

Conclusion

Becoming a flight attendant is the fastest way to make aviation your profession. Instead of years of training, there is a selection process, initial training under Part-CC with a focus on safety, the EU-wide recognized attestation and familiarization at the airline. In return, the job demands a lot: shift work, time zones, responsibility in emergencies and friendliness even after the fourth rotation. If you like that, you get a workplace that spotters otherwise only see through telephoto lenses.