FAI is proud to announce the official recognition of Indoor Para Skydiving as its first para-sports discipline. The sport will debut with a World Cup in 2026, followed by the inaugural FAI World Championships in 2027.

Indoor Para Skydiving is an adaptation of the FAI-recognised sport of indoor skydiving, and the parameters and regulations have been specifically designed to provide opportunities for individuals with physical or cognitive special needs to compete at international level.

The forthcoming World Cup and World Championships will develop Indoor Para Skydiving internationally, inspiring spectators worldwide and bringing new participants to the discipline.

This historic moment in skydiving was formalised at the 2025 FAI Skydiving Commission Annual Meeting.

FAI President, Greg Principato, applauded the project to include the new discipline to the air sports portfolio, saying:

"The initiative of the FAI Skydiving Commission to create a Para Skydiving discipline is important and welcomed.  Air sports are a source of inspiration and pride wherever they are practiced.  The goal of making air sports more widely accessible and available is critical and this move is a welcome development. I look forward to watching the competitors do amazing things."

How does an Indoor Para Skydiving competition work?

While the final rules and the definition of who can participate are still to be finalised in the Sporting Code, the core principle is that during the race event, the flyer must touch, in a pre-determined sequence, electronic pads placed on the wall of the wind tunnel. The person who achieves the full sequence in the shortest time is the winner. The maximum time is set at 75 seconds (150 seconds for the final rounds).

Background to Indoor Para Skydiving

Indoor skydiving in wind tunnels has revolutionised skydiving in recent years, and FAI embraced the new discipline, helping evolve the sport towards the first World Championships in 2015.

Indoor Para Skydiving was developed in France under the French Parachute Federation (FFP) around the same time, as a way to include athletes with special needs into competition. The sport received a boost in 2022 when the project was awarded a sum of €500,000 from the EU Erasmus programme.