Getting a Taiwanese Drone Licence: Tiers, the No-Skipping Rule, Fees, and Timeline

🌏 中文版

The previous piece covered who needs a licence. This one covers how you get one: how many tiers, how long, how much.

Start with the most commonly misunderstood point: most people don't need one at all. Individuals flying under 2kg recreationally are exempt (though 250g and above still requires registration). The people who genuinely need one are individuals flying 2kg or heavier, and anyone flying under a company's name — a drone owned by a legal entity requires a professional licence regardless of weight.

Three licence classes

The student licence gets overlooked but is the best value on the list: available at 14, no test, NT$250, and it makes supervised practice legal. Anyone planning to take the practical test should get this first.

Professional tiers have two dimensions

Most people only see one of them.

Dimension one: weight bracket (basic tiers)

Dimension two: restriction waivers (advanced tiers, three groups)

Advanced tiers exist to waive operating restrictions, grouped per Article 99-14 of the Civil Aviation Act:

Two things that must be stated plainly:

1. You test for as many groups as you need. Night flying plus dropping means G1 and G2 — two practical tests, two fees.
2. An individual holding an advanced licence still cannot waive anything. Under the regulations, only government agencies, schools, and legal entities may apply for waiver permits, and the application must be filed 15 days before the activity with an activity plan; the permit is valid 3 months (6 months for agriculture-registered entities, 1 year for agencies performing official duties). For an individual, an advanced licence means "qualified to perform such missions when employed by a legal entity," not "allowed to shoot at night."

Sequential qualification: no skipping tiers

Professional licences must be climbed in order. Annex 9 of the regulations sets the experience thresholds:

• For advanced Ia (no weight annotation) or basic II: hold basic I (no weight annotation) for 1 month or more
• For advanced Ib: hold advanced Ia (no weight annotation) for 1 month or more
• For advanced IIc: hold both basic II and advanced Ib for 3 months or more each
• For basic III: hold advanced IIc for 3 months or more
• For advanced IIId: hold basic III for 1 month or more

Stack those requirements and reaching the top bracket realistically takes 18 months to two years. That's by design, not administrative slowness — so if your career plan needs an advanced licence, start accumulating the prerequisite months early.

The written test

• Format: online question bank, computer-administered, score shown immediately
• Pass mark: 80 out of 100
• Four subjects (per Annex 9): the Civil Aviation Act and related regulations, basic flight principles, meteorology, emergency handling and flight decision-making
• Validity: for a professional licence, the practical test must be completed within one year of passing written, or the written result lapses

The CAA publishes the test specification and question bank. Read the specification before drilling questions — regulations carry the heaviest weighting and get amended on a rolling basis, so memorizing an old bank will bite you. (in Chinese)

The practical test

You supply your own aircraft. Per Article 21, candidates must bring a drone meeting Annex 12 specifications. Basic-tier reference airframe specs (per CAA guidance):

Content covers pre- and post-flight checks, mission setup, mission execution, mission conclusion, and emergency procedures.

The two things candidates most commonly fail on are attitude mode (manual flight without GPS assistance) and route orientation. Neither is a written trap — they're capability gates. When GPS drops, the aircraft switches to attitude mode automatically, so unfamiliarity means encountering it for the first time under test conditions.

Retests: failed sections may be retested 30 days after receiving results.

Medical examination

Professional licences only. Per CAA guidance:

• Standard cases use the passenger-car driving licence registration form under the small passenger vehicle medical criteria — the motorcycle licence form is not accepted
• Must be performed at a medical institution designated by the highway monitoring authority or a teaching hospital (or via civil aviation personnel medical certification)
• Covers left, right, and binocular vision, night vision, and visual field
• Only operators of drones 150kg and above need the Class B aviation personnel standard
• Bring the original certificate, valid within one year, on practical test day (not required for endorsements or retests)

Fees: here are the statutory numbers

Circulating fee figures contradict each other — I've seen "NT$500 practical test," "NT$500 certificate," and "NT$250 certificate" in different guides. The authority is Annex 17, Fee Schedule of the Remotely Piloted Drone Management Regulations:

Totaled by common path:

General licence      written 200 + certificate 250              = NT$450
Professional basic   written 200 + practical 1,200 + cert 500    = NT$1,900
Each advanced group  practical 1,200                             = NT$1,200/group

These are statutory fees only — they exclude the medical exam, training courses, and the cost of supplying your own test aircraft. The last two are where the real money goes. A machine meeting the basic-tier reference spec (multi-rotor with >90cm diagonal, 4kg+ takeoff weight) is not cheap on its own.

Full timeline

Register the drone (250g and above)
      ↓
[optional] Student licence (age 14, NT$250, no test) → supervised practice
      ↓
Written test (NT$200, 80 to pass)
      ↓
   ┌──────────────┴──────────────┐
   │                             │
General licence            Medical exam (car-licence standard)
apply within 30 days              ↓
pay NT$250                 Practical test (NT$1,200)
                           ※ within 1 year of passing written
                                  ↓
                           Apply within 30 days, pay NT$500
                           (one 30-day extension available)
                                  ↓
                           Accumulate months → climb tiers / add G1–G3

Licences are valid 3 years, renewed within 3 months before expiry. General licence renewal requires no retest; professional renewal requires a fresh medical exam and a renewal test (written under 25kg, written plus practical at 25kg and above).

Where the test centres are

Per CAA guidance, approved practical test sites are in Taipei, New Taipei, Taoyuan, Miaoli, Taichung, Yunlin, Tainan, Yilan, Hualien, and Pingtung, with more under evaluation. Written tests are available in the north, center, and south.

All registration, changes, results, and issuance happen online through the Drone Management Information System. Withdrawals must be filed 4 days before the test date; miss that and you re-register and re-pay after the test date passes. (in Chinese)

Three practical judgments

1. Confirm you actually need one. Individuals under 2kg flying recreationally are exempt. Taking the general test to "feel more professional" buys privileges you won't use unless you fly 2kg or heavier.
2. If you're going professional, start accumulating months early. The sequential system makes time an incompressible cost. NT$1,900 is not the barrier; 18 months of prerequisites is.
3. Fees are cheap; the test aircraft and practice are not. NT$450 or NT$1,900 makes it easy to underestimate the commitment — a spec-compliant airframe plus enough practice hours is where the spending actually happens.

References

Statutory text (in Chinese)

• Remotely Piloted Drone Management Regulations — Laws & Regulations Database (Articles 19–23, Annex 9 test rules, Annex 12 airframe specs, Annex 17 fees)
• Annex 17 Fee Schedule

Regulator (in Chinese)

• CAA — Licence testing (test specifications, question bank, issuance guide)
• CAA — Licence testing and issuance guide
• CAA — Article 99-10: registration and licensing (ages and test subjects by class)
• CAA — FAQ for the general public (medical exam, airframe specs, test sites, renewal)
• Drone Management Information System

On this site

• Taiwan's Drone Rules in Plain Language
• The Drone Industry Job Map: Eleven Roles, and Which Ones a Software Person Can Actually Enter