Special Report
These Countries Are Buying the Most F-35 Lightning II Fighter Jets
Published:
As part of the fifth generation fighters, the F-35 Lightning II employs features like stealth, high maneuverability and supercruise that were not available to previous generations of aircraft. It is incredibly versatile in terms of its weapons payload, and it can carry up to 18,000 pounds of these munitions.
The cost for the F-35 ranges depending on the variant. The F-35A is the stock standard variant and costs roughly $110 million per unit. The B variant costs slightly more at around $136 million per unit but it incorporates a short take-off and vertical landing system, which allows it to take off from extremely short runways as well land vertically. The C variant is designed to be launched from aircraft carriers and costs about $117 million per unit.
To identify the countries buying the most F-35 Lightning II fighter jets, 24/7 Wall St. reviewed the 2024 World Air Forces report from FlightGlobal, an aviation and aerospace industry publication. We ranked these countries according to the number of F-35 jets on order. We included supplemental information regarding active F-35s in respective fleets, military branches that will be using these aircraft, and what variants of the F-35 are on order or are currently in service.
Only 20 countries have ordered or actually employ these fighter jets and all are allies of the United States. As such, it is highly unlikely that adversarial nations like China or Russia would purchase or come to possess these aircraft. (Here is every major fighter plane flown by the U.S. Air Force.)
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