I took the most fun flight of my life to see why electric planes still haven’t gone mainstream

Flying in Beta Technologies' Alia CX300 showed me why electric planes aren't mainstream yet By ...

September 24, 2026

Flying in Beta Technologies' Alia CX300 showed me why electric planes aren't mainstream yet

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Daniel T. Allen

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Jessica Orwig

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US airline fares rose almost 24% over the past year, making the prospect of cheaper short flights especially appealing.

One possible solution: electric planes.

For our video series, "The Limit," I recently took a 25-minute flight on Beta Technologies' Alia CX300. The journey used about $5.25 in electricity. A comparable trip in a conventional jet-fuel-powered plane would have cost an estimated 10 times as much in fuel, about $60

Electric aviation has spent decades promising an electric-car-style revolution. Beyond lower costs, electric planes could make short flights quieter and produce no in-flight emissions.

Now, one Vermont-based company is facing a crucial test.

Beta Technologies is aiming to get its Alia CX300 certified by the Federal Aviation Administration by the end of 2027. The plane has already flown nearly 400 miles on a charge and stayed airborne for over five hours.

The question is whether those advantages can translate into a viable business. Other electric-aircraft startups have run into financial trouble after spending years trying to bring aircraft to market.

I toured Beta's manufacturing facility, watched how it builds its batteries and aircraft, and flew aboard the CX300 myself.

What I saw helps explain why electric planes still aren't regularly carrying passengers, more than 50 years after the first electric aircraft flew — and what Beta has to accomplish over the next year if it wants to change that.

Beta thinks controlling almost everything could give it an edge.

Other electric-aircraft companies have already gone under after spending years and billions of dollars trying to bring their planes to market.

Beta is taking a vertically integrated approach, building its own batteries, propulsion systems, planes, and charging technology.

The company went public in November 2025, raising more than $1 billion. “It was the largest founder-led industrial IPO in history,” Beta founder and CEO Kyle Clark told me.

The physics are still working against electric planes.

In order to fly about 300 nautical miles, the Alia CX300 must carry nearly 3,000 pounds of batteries. The jet fuel needed to fly a comparable distance would weigh only about 50 pounds.

The CX300 can carry just five passengers and one pilot, underscoring how battery weight constrains the size and range of electric aircraft.

That's why Beta is initially targeting relatively short routes of about 150 to 200 miles.

So Beta designed an airplane around using as little energy as possible.

The CX300's 50-foot tapered wingspan, V-shaped tail, and rear-mounted propeller reduce drag and conserve battery power. Its wing shape was inspired by the Arctic tern, a bird known for its long migrations.

During my flight, the pilot shut off the motor, and the aircraft continued gliding without power. With a roughly 17-to-1 lift-to-drag ratio, Beta says the CX300 could glide down to a suitable landing strip after a complete loss of power.

The CX300 is fast and surprisingly maneuverable.

While I was inside the aircraft, the sheer acceleration took me by surprise.

The CX300 reached roughly 87 knots, about 100 mph, before lifting off, and once we were airborne, the pilot put the plane through a series of sharp rolls and banks.

The flight was smooth overall, though the sharp banking was enough to make me a little queasy. I don't blame the electric propulsion: I think that would have happened to me in any small plane.

Then there's the infrastructure problem.

A gas-powered aircraft can land and refuel at airports around the world, while an electric plane needs charging infrastructure to get back into the air.

Beta has installed more than 120 charging stations across the US, and its system can recharge an aircraft in under an hour.

The company is also building the charging technology itself, meaning it can develop the planes, batteries, propulsion systems, and infrastructure as parts of the same ecosystem.

Beta is spending hundreds of millions before its plane reaches commercial service.

Getting the technology to work is expensive. Beta says it generated a little more than $35 million in revenue last year against about $400 million in operating expenses.

The company is also building a business around replacement batteries, which it expects customers to need repeatedly over an aircraft's lifetime.

2027 could be the real test.

Beta is targeting FAA-conforming production of the Alia CX300, its conventional-takeoff aircraft, at the end of 2026 or early 2027, with certification expected by the end of 2027.

The company plans to start with medical, cargo, and defense missions before moving into passenger service, while continuing to develop a vertical-takeoff version that wouldn't need a conventional runway.

Certification still won't guarantee cheap electric flights.

Electricity itself can be cheap: The CX300 demonstration flight I was on cost only a few dollars in electricity, according to Beta.

Commercial operators would still have to pay for pilots, maintenance, insurance, charging infrastructure, and battery replacements.

Beta has already shown that an electric plane can fly hundreds of miles. By the end of 2027, it hopes to prove something much harder: that one can make it through certification and become a commercial aircraft.

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Daniel T. Allen

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Daniel is a producer and host at Business Insider, creating videos that explore the limits of possibility in technology and the human body.He is a 2025 News Emmy Award winner for “The True Cost of Mining Electric Car Battery Metals” and helped to launch Authorized Account, an interview series that achieved BI’s highest average watch time. His work includes producing the most-watched video on the Insider News channel and developing World Wide Waste, a hit series about global garbage systems that generated more than 38 million hours of watch time and added 500,000 new subscribers by late 2024.

Jessica Orwig

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Jessica Orwig is a senior editor at Business Insider, where she collaborates with reporters, editors, and producers across teams to shape, write, edit, and publish stories that connect with a global audience. While her roots are in science and technology journalism, her work today spans business, careers, culture, and the big ideas shaping the future.She earned her Master’s in Science & Technology Journalism from Texas A&M University and holds a Bachelor’s in Astronomy & Physics from The Ohio State University. Throughout her career, she’s helped lead coverage on everything from space exploration and climate change to innovation, the future of work, and evolving cultural trends.Career HighlightsLed coverage on scientific milestones, including:

• Blue Origin's inaugural New Glenn launch
• Intuitive Machine's groundbreaking moon landing for the US
• SpaceX’s Polaris Dawn historic spaceflight 
• NASA’s Parker Solar Probe Historic Flyby
• Japan’s SLIM lunar landing
• The first image of a black hole
• India’s historic Moon landing
• SpaceX’s inaugural Starship-Super Heavy launch
• Discovery of gravitational waves
• NASA’s Pluto flyby

Reported on breaking news and scientific discoveries, including:

• Microplastics in the human brain
• Peregrine Mission One’s failed flight
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• SpaceX Starship explosions
• Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument’s 3D map of the universe and what it reveals
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• Earth’s mysterious inner core behavior

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