The commercial drone industry has spent years proving what it can do. The use cases are no longer theoretical; the technology has matured considerably; and the regulatory framework, however imperfect, is taking a more defined shape. Even with all of that progress, though, there are real and pressing questions about where things stand right now, particularly for the people doing the day-to-day work of flying missions, managing fleets, and keeping operations compliant.

Commercial UAV Expo and Pilot Institute have partnered to put out our State of the Commercial Drone Industry Survey, and we are asking people at every level of the industry to participate. If you work in the commercial drone sector at any capacity, your voice will help shape our look at where the industry stands today, and where it figures to head in the next few years.

A lot of industry conversation happens at the conference level, the policy level, or the vendor level. Those perspectives are valuable, to be clear, but they do not always reflect what is happening on the ground. The pilot managing a public safety DFR program has a different read on the regulatory environment than a lobbyist working the same issue in Washington. The fleet manager overseeing infrastructure inspection contracts has a different view of hardware procurement than a manufacturer's marketing team.

To start, the findings will drive the opening keynote at Commercial UAV Expo 2026, taking place September 1 in Las Vegas. That session will dig into what the data actually shows, with a focus on what operators are thinking, what is working, and what still needs to change. It is designed to set the tone for the rest of the conference by grounding the conversation in real feedback from real practitioners.

Second, Commercial UAV News will compile the results into a published industry report that will be free to access for everyone. That report will be available to the broader community and will serve as a resource for operators, enterprise teams, policymakers, and others tracking where the industry is headed.

If you are a pilot, fleet manager, operations lead, or compliance professional working in the commercial drone space, your perspective belongs in this data set. The more responses we get, the more useful and accurate the final picture becomes.