In the current battle for the Airbus A380 in Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024, a strong contender is certainly the version by FlyByWire, not least because it’s free.
The aircraft has been in development by a volunteer team as a freeware project for a long time, and the version for MSFS 2020 was finally released in October 2024.
The imminent release of the native Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 version was teased at FlightSimExpo, and FlyByWire delivered. The aircraft can now be downloaded from the developer’s own installer. Keep in mind that it’s the version marked as “development.”
As explained in the detailed blog post, it includes separate variants with and without the cabin, taking advantage of MSFS 2024’s modular system, on top of improved lighting, model improvements, the ability to hide the sidestick, and pretty relevant performance improvements, as you can see in the tables below.
Incidentally, the new tech made the 4k and 8k versions redundant, so they won’t be offered anymore for Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024.
Work on the aircraft for Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 doesn’t end here, as an extensive remodeling project is going on, aiming to ” take the visual fidelity of the FlyByWire A380X to an entirely new level.” Visual elements will “continuously improve in subsequent updates as our modeling project progresses.”
The cabin is also still in the process of being fully converted to the modular layout, so there is still room for performance improvement and visuals in upcoming updates.
One thing is for sure, this is just another big milestone in a massive community success story, with a developer made of many volunteers offering their time for free, going toe-to-toe with professional developers, and arguably showing them how things are done.
Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 is currently available for PC, Xbox Series X|S, and PS5, but it’s worth mentioning that FlyByWire’s aircraft is offered only for PC.
If you’d like to read more flight simulation news, you can find plenty in our latest roundup article from earlier today.
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