Is Embraer’s Subsequent-Gen Turboprop program canceled? Not precisely.
Again in August 2022, we ran an article about Embraer’s formidable plan to reinvent the turboprop.
The Brazilian producer was speaking massive: a contemporary regional plane that may mix the effectivity of a propeller-driven design with the consolation and pace passengers affiliate with jets. Letters of intent for greater than 250 plane rolled in on the Farnborough Air Present, and Embraer projected an entry into service by 2028.
It was an thrilling time. The regional jet had dominated headlines for years, however the turboprop—lengthy a workhorse of regional connectivity—all of a sudden regarded prefer it might need a brand new lease on life.
Quick ahead to the top of 2025, and the image seems very totally different. What as soon as appeared like the beginning of a brand new chapter for regional aviation has now been shelved indefinitely.
A Program Stalled
In June 2025, Embraer Business Plane CEO Arjan Meijer instructed Aviation Week that the turboprop program is “on ice”—and never simply evenly chilled. “It’s fairly far down within the freezer for the time being,” he admitted on the Paris Air Present.
It’s fairly far down within the freezer for the time being.”
Embraer Business Plane CEO Arjan Meijer, on the standing of Embraer’s Subsequent-Gen Turboprop Program
The rationale comes all the way down to expertise. The plane Embraer envisioned in 2022 promised to be 20% quicker and 15% cheaper to function per seat than present turboprops, whereas providing a cabin extra according to the corporate’s E-Jet household. However to attain these targets, Embraer wanted propulsion expertise that merely hasn’t materialized.
By the top of 2022, the corporate had anticipated to decide on between Pratt & Whitney Canada and Rolls-Royce as an engine provider. That call by no means got here. In early 2023, Embraer quietly confirmed delays, and by mid-2025, the decision was clear: and not using a appropriate engine, this system couldn’t transfer ahead.
The Promise Versus the Actuality
Once we first lined this system, Embraer’s roadmap regarded formidable however achievable. To know how far issues have shifted, it’s price retracing this system’s journey:
2017 — Embraer first proposes the TPNG (Turboprop Subsequent Era) idea.
July 2022 (Farnborough Air Present) — Greater than 250 letters of intent introduced.
August 16, 2022 — Our AvGeekery function highlights the disruptive potential.
Finish of 2022 — Focused deadline for engine choice.
Early/Mid-2023 — Deliberate program launch.
2028 — Entry into service for first variant (50- or 90-seat).
2029 — Second variant to observe.
June 2025 (Paris Air Present) — Program formally “on ice.”
In contrast, as 2025’s finish approaches rapidly, the fact is stark: no engine has been chosen, no program launched, and any hope of an entry into service earlier than the 2030s now seems distant.
Embraer’s Shift in Focus
With the turboprop shelved, Embraer has turned its consideration again to the jets which have carried its industrial success for the previous 20 years.
The E175-E1 is getting avionics and cabin upgrades, equivalent to improved climate radar, bigger overhead bins, and temper lighting. These upgrades are designed to maintain it aggressive within the US regional market, the place scope clauses nonetheless prohibit the usage of heavier E2 variants.
The E190-E2 and E195-E2 proceed to anchor Embraer’s industrial lineup. They profit from cockpit commonality with the E175-E1 and enchantment to airways in search of environment friendly sub-150-seat jets.
Future prospects, equivalent to E195-E1 freighter conversions, are being mentioned however not but formalized.
Meijer has been clear: Embraer isn’t strolling away from regional aviation. It’s simply selecting to spend money on incremental enhancements to its jets moderately than roll the cube on an all-new turboprop.
The Market That Acquired Away—for Now
The irony is that Embraer was concentrating on a real hole available in the market. Because the pandemic, smaller US cities have misplaced air service as 50-seat jets disappeared from fleets. As Meijer famous this 12 months: “I undoubtedly see a requirement within the US for between smaller cities since that phase is shrinking.”
I undoubtedly see a requirement within the US for between smaller cities, since that phase is shrinking.
Embraer Business Plane CEO Arjan Meijer
However who will step as much as meet that demand?
Boeing and Airbus don’t have any plans to reenter the turboprop market. The Airbus A220 is a powerful performer, however too giant for a lot of smaller communities.
ATR is sticking with incremental updates to the ATR 42 and 72, opting in opposition to a clean-sheet design.
Bombardier and de Havilland are out of the industrial turboprop recreation.
Mitsubishi canceled its SpaceJet.
China and Russia are unlikely to make inroads in Western markets anytime quickly.
That leaves Embraer. And but, for now, Embraer is content material to sit down it out.
Forecasts Reset
Embraer’s personal 2025 Market Outlook displays this retrenchment. The corporate now initiatives world demand for about 10,500 sub-150-seat plane by 2044, of which only one,780 are anticipated to be turboprops. That’s a marked drop from earlier forecasts of greater than 2,100.
The explanations are clear: engine expertise isn’t prepared, certification dangers are excessive, and airways in North America and Europe are leaning extra towards regional jets than turboprops.
Nonetheless, in markets like Asia-Pacific and rising economies, the economics of turboprops stay engaging. The demand hasn’t disappeared—it’s simply ready for the appropriate plane to seize it.
Embraer’s Subsequent-Gen Turboprop Stays Disruptive, However Not for the Proper Cause
Once we first lined Embraer’s next-gen turboprop in 2022, it was billed as a program that would redefine regional aviation. The numbers regarded robust, the curiosity was real, and the momentum was constructing.
Three years later, the narrative has shifted dramatically. The turboprop program isn’t lifeless, but it surely’s “fairly far down within the freezer,” as Arjan Meijer put it. The hole available in the market continues to be there, the demand continues to be actual, however the plane that was supposed to satisfy it stays frozen in improvement limbo.
For now, Embraer is targeted on what it already does greatest: refining the E-Jet household and lengthening its industrial success within the sub-150-seat jet market. Whether or not the corporate ultimately returns to turboprops will rely not simply on Embraer’s ambition, however on whether or not propulsion expertise can meet up with its imaginative and prescient.
And so, Embraer’s next-gen turboprop stays precisely what we known as it in our first article: disruptive. Solely this time, the disruption is the absence of progress, leaving a gap within the regional market that nobody else appears able to fill.
