US Fighter Jets Ranked (2021)

the u.s military aircraft fleet is unquestionably the best in the world the sheer number of aircraft and the technology of those aircraft is unmatched especially in the fighter jets not only are these u.s fighter jets like gorgeous supercars in the skies but they are of unparalleled ability but how did these u.s fighter jets stack up against each other in this episode of aerospace engineer explains i'm going to pit all the u.s fighter jets currently in service against each other to see which one really is the top gun [Music] so this was an incredibly difficult task for me to perform not only because all of these u.s fighter jets are incredibly beloved by everyone involved in the military but they're also very comparable capabilities so i have no doubt that this is going to stir an incredible amount of controversy up in the comments section below so feel free to let me know how wrong i am down in the comments section the way that i rank these fighter jets is by four major categories the first is maneuverability second lethality third advanced technologies and fourth versatility a few of the things i looked at when considering maneuverability are the aspect ratio of the aircraft the speed the thrust the weight ratio the overall thrust and the climb rate the aspect ratio is a ratio of the wingspan over the wing area that basically dictates how maneuverable an aircraft is in one easy number lower the aspect ratio the more maneuverable the aircraft some of the things i considered when looking at lethality where the number of hardpoints the payload capacity and the weapons on board a hardpoint is a point on the aircraft that you're able to connect weapons to such as bombs or missiles and for the advanced technology section i included things such as thrust vectoring stealth technology and other avionics and when i considered the overall versatility of the aircraft i considered things such as whether or not it can do a short takeoff or a vertical landing it's multi-role capabilities and its range so without further ado let's get started coming up first at number 12 is the av-8b harrier and although this is a historic aircraft as the harrier was the first aircraft to be a jet and take off vertically and land vertically but it has very limited capabilities for instance this is only one of the two fighter jets on this list that cannot reach supersonic speeds coming in at the second slowest of any aircraft on this list with a top speed of only 673 miles an hour the harrier also sports a pretty limited combat range at about 350 miles and although it has an average payload capacity of about nine thousand two hundred pounds it only has six hardpoints so for me this was an easy last place and next on our list coming in at number 11 is the f5 tiger ii the f5 has decidedly the least amount of thrust of any aircraft on this list coming in at a total thrust of only about seven thousand pound force and it also has the unfortunate title of being the slowest supersonic aircraft on this list it also has the worst range of any of these aircraft with a combat range of about 140 miles but on the plus side it does have a price tag of only a cool 2.1 million dollars the next aircraft coming up i'm sure is going to make a lot of people upset with me but coming in at number 10 is the a10 thunderbolts the warthog has been an absolute workhorse for the military it has been one of the best ground support aircraft in history which is why it might surprise a lot of people that it's this low on this list however the a-10 is not meant to be an advanced fighter although it is incredibly piece of engineering built with incredible multiple redundancies a titanium cockpit all these features are made to make it one of the best ground support aircrafts out there but the a-10 has the unfortunate dishonor of being the slowest aircraft at this list clocking in a max speed of only about 439 miles an hour and an abysmal climb rate of only 6 000 feet per minute the a-10 does have a pretty good payload capacity at about 16 000 pounds and it's tied for first for the number of hardpoints with 11 hardpoints again lending itself to the incredible ground support aircraft that it is but with a combat range like 290 miles an hour and a thrust-to-weight ratio of 0.36 and a top speed that's the lowest on this list i'm sorry i have to give it 10th place don't hate me now deciding between the next two aircraft on this list was probably the most difficult decision that i had in the whole ranking process if anything some lists would probably just put these as a tie but i'm not going to do that not going to be a sellout coming in at number 9 is the f-18 [Music] hornets so i am putting four different variants of the f-18 hornet in this section at slot number nine however i am not including the super hornet that's entirely another beast so it's actually easy for me to put the f-18 above the previous aircraft because the f-18 really is a step up it's the next caliber of fighter jet the f-18 hornet has a decent climb rate of about 50 000 feet per minute and a max speed of mach 1.8 and if you don't know what a mach number is make sure you check out my prior video where i explained what supersonic flight is and what a mach number is the f-18 is also an incredibly versatile aircraft being that it was designed to be a carrier-borne aircraft and carry out an attack roll as well for ground support and like i alluded to earlier number eight is where it really starts to get tricky for me coming in at number eight the f-16 fighting falcon now before i recorded this video i had actually asked my instagram followers which aircraft they thought was better and i got a pretty decent debate between the f-18 and the f-16 but ultimately looking at the numbers had to go with the f-16 there are a few reasons why the first being the f-16 has an incredible climb rate the climb rate of the f-16 is 72 000 feet per minute squarely placing it in first place the f-16 also has a slightly faster top speed at mach 2.05 compared to the f-18s 1.8 the thrust-to-weight ratio of the f-16 also edges out the f-18 coming in at 1.095 and it has a larger payload capacity coming in at 17 000 pounds compared to the f-18s thirteen thousand seven hundred pounds overall looking at the numbers i just felt the f-16 was slightly more maneuverable more agile and better nimble fighter than the f-18 which slightly edged it out for me so i did get some feedback on my instagram after i posed a question there that the f-18 is one of the best adversaries within visual range however i had to go with the f-16 it really was revolutionary it was the very first aircraft that was actually designed to be dynamically unstable making it incredibly maneuverable but like i said feel free to disagree with me down in the comments below i'm an aerospace engineer like i said i'm not a pilot so i've never flown either of these aircraft i don't have first-hand experience with them i'm just going by the numbers here as a navy brat i grew up adoring naval aviation i still do but while researching this video i gained a renewed appreciation for how incredible the air force aircraft really are coming in at number seven is the f-15 eagle the f-15 is tied for the fastest aircraft on this list coming in at a top speed of mach 2.5 it's a twin engine aircraft with each of those engines putting out 14 590 pounds of thrust and a respectable thrust to weight ratio of 1.07 it is the single greatest combat range of any of the aircraft on this list coming out over 1200 miles coming in at number six should be no surprise to anyone but its younger brother the f-15e strike eagle this re-engined f-15 has the same top speed of about mach 2.5 but gives out a thrust of over 17 800 pounds it does take a small hit on its combat range coming in at 791 miles as opposed to the 1200 of the previous variants however it still comes in at second best on the entire list couple that with the fact that it gives the second best total thrust of any of these aircraft coming in at 35 000 pounds coming in at number five is the aircraft i had dreamed ever since i was a little kid that i would be able to fly in but my hopes are dashed when i realized that i did not have 20 20 vision in both eyes the f-18 super hornet the f-18 sports brand new engines increasing its thrust and allowing it to have even more hardpoints clocking in on 11 hardpoints it puts up respectable numbers for top speed maneuverability and all those other metrics however what really sets it apart is its newly reduced radar cross-section its avionics and its versatility in fact the reason that i put the f-18 above the f-15 exclusively is because the f-15 was only designed to be an air superiority fighter while the f-18 was designed with a variety of missions in mind at its core the f-18 super horn is a carrier-borne aircraft and as such it has to perform a variety of tasks such as attack missions fighter missions air-to-air combat roles it really has to be a jack of all trades for me that's what really put it above the f-15 in my mind and if you're very familiar with military fighter jets you may be asking yourself are there still even four more fighter jets out there and to answer that question coming in at number four three and two are the f-35 lightning the reason that the f-35 comes in three different places is because it comes in the a b and c variant which all have very different capabilities coming in at number four is the f-35b the marine variant although the marine variant is the only one that has stovall capability or short takeoff vertical landing capability it takes a huge hit on range because of it the f-35b has the shortest very range of any of the aircraft on this list coming on the only 900 miles meanwhile the combat range is not much better coming in at only 550 miles and that's the reason that i put it below the other variants of the f-35 however the f-35 as a whole is still clearly a top-tier aircraft all of the f-35 variants feature thrust vectoring all aspects stealth advanced avionics and a payload capacity that allows this aircraft to stand out above the crowd the f-35b however has the lowest payload capacity coming in at only 15 000 pounds while the other f-35 variants come in at 18 000 pounds of payload capacity coming in at number three is the f-35a the air force variant of the f-35 the reason that i put the f-35a here is because although it does have almost the same exact combat range as the f-35c the navy variant it severely lacks in its versatility coming in at number two the f-35c the navy variant is able to be a carrier-borne aircraft in other words it can fold its wings and it can deploy and land from an aircraft carrier this greatly enhances the f-35's ability to perform a variety of combat roles such as attack missions and air-to-air combat and finally without any further ado we have the single greatest aircraft in the single greatest air force in the entire world the f-22 raptor [Music] should be no surprise here for anyone who's familiar with aviation because the f-22 is unparalleled it has by far the best maneuverability thrust vectoring all aspects stealth it was the first fifth generation fighter ever it has an incredible climb rate of a 69 000 feet per minute it has a max speed of about 2.25 the f-22 has the lowest aspect ratio on this list making it one of the most maneuverable aircraft ever conceived but its total thrust is what really sets the f-22 apart it has the greatest thrust of any fighter jet ever coming in at over 52 000 pounds of thrust so if you found this video informative make sure you hit the like button if you want to learn more about aerospace engineering from an aerospace engineer that anyone can understand make sure you subscribe to the channel thank you so much for watching and [Music] [Music] godspeed [Music] you

Channel: Aviation Austin

Views: 375,792

Keywords: us fighter jets ranked (2021), top fighter jets, ranked jets, fighter jets, f-35 lightning, f-22 raptor, fifth-generation, f/a-18-e/f super hornet, f-16 fighting falcon, f-16 viper, f-15 eagle, f-15 strike eagle, a-10 thunderbolt, harrier, military aircraft, multirole fighter, advanced fighter jets, fastest aircraft, top 10 fighter jets, best fighter jets, best fighter jets in the world, engineer explains, aerospace engineer explains, aerospace engineering, aviation austin

Id: K2L8eMAwUes

Length: 13min 44sec (824 seconds)

Published: Thu Jan 07 2021