Is Meteorology (050) Hard? And Can You Memorise It?

The atmosphere, temperature, pressure and wind, clouds and precipitation, icing, thunderstorms, aviation weather reports (METAR, TAF) and significant weather charts.

At 84 questions it is the largest question count in the ATPL set.

For the full topic-by-topic syllabus breakdown, see the Meteorology subject guide.

Any single number here would be false precision, so we won’t give one. As a rough planning figure, most self-study candidates allocate 40–80 hours per subject, and students report Meteorology typically sitting toward the upper end of that range. The largest question count in the set and a broad, conceptual syllabus put Meteorology firmly at the upper end.

Your own figure depends on background, maths comfort and whether you are studying full-time — treat the range as a budget to adjust, not a target to hit.

Code formats (METAR/TAF) and classification tables are memorisation work. But the heart of the subject — why weather does what it does — has to be understood: the exam habitually presents scenarios rather than definitions, and reworded scenario questions defeat answer-memorisation quickly.

Not part of our seeded affinity groups, but it sits in a prerequisite chain: Meteorology feeds Flight Planning (033), so schedule 050 before 033.

How the pairings fit into a full plan — and why order matters — is covered in the recommended order of study, with the sitting mechanics in sittings & limits.