Touchscreens come to 777X flight deck

Bringing today’s technology in the hands of pilots

Boeing’s innovation in the flight deck continues, with the introduction of touchscreens in the 777X forward displays; a first in the air transport industry.

With touchscreens being used on smarts devices by people around the world every day, and pilots already bringing tablets into the flight deck, making the 777X even more intuitive and easy for pilots is a logical next step.

“We want to design a flight deck that pilots are going to be familiar with and that will provide the best interaction experience for them,” said Mark Nikolic, Boeing Flight Deck Human Factors Engineer.  

The 777X’s new technologies will allow pilots to work more efficiently while maintaining significant operational commonality with today’s 777.

Boeing has tested touchscreen technology on flight decks in simulators for the last five years and in 2014, used the ecoDemonstrator flying testbed to give pilots real-time flight experience with touch technology in the forward displays.

“We find that touchscreens perform as well as or better than current devices in the flight deck for interacting with the displays,” said Brian Gilbert, Boeing Flight Deck Integration Lead. 

Boeing requirements for touch capability include bezel features designed to provide bracing and added stability in turbulence, and pilots can also interact with displays with rotary cursor controls.

Boeing’s 777X flight deck hardware is capable of supporting multiple touch points. This means two pilots can simultaneously interact with their half of the lower display.