FAA Certifies Boeing 737 Max 7, Ending Eight-Year Delay

The Federal Aviation Administration certified Boeing's 737 Max 7 on Monday, August 3, closing out one of the longest aircraft certification fights in recent memory.

The plane first flew in March 2018. Boeing expected it in service with launch customer Southwest Airlines by early 2019, according to Simple Flying. That timeline collapsed after the worldwide 737 Max grounding in March 2019, following two crashes of the in-service Max 8 that killed 346 people. Then came the pandemic, a redesign of the plane's engine anti-ice system, and a wave of tougher post-crash certification requirements that Boeing had to satisfy on top of the original program.

The FAA said the certification "reflects years of sustained work to resolve complex technical issues and complete a thorough review of the airplane's design and supporting safety analyses," according to CNBC. The agency also added the Max 7 to Boeing's production certificate, letting the company build the jets under its approved manufacturing system, according to Simple Flying.

Stephanie Pope, president and CEO of Boeing Commercial Airplanes, called the approval validation of "the rigor of our airplane's design" and credited the development team's "resilience" through what she described as "an extended pandemic" and a shift to new certification processes, per Simple Flying.

What actually got fixed

This wasn't a rubber stamp. The FAA required changes beyond the anti-ice system redesign, including updates to flight control software and the crew alerting system, according to CNBC and The Points Guy. The test program included more than 1,000 hours of flight and ground testing plus additional human-factors reviews, according to Simple Flying. Boeing withdrew a request for a temporary anti-ice exemption back in 2024 rather than fight for a shortcut, choosing the longer compliance path instead.

Boeing didn't get to fast-track anything. The company ate nearly eight years of delay, redesigned systems flagged during testing, and let the FAA run the full post-crash gauntlet before getting a certificate. For a company that spent years under fire for cutting corners, that's a data point worth noting.

Don't expect to fly one soon

Certification is not the same as boarding one. Boeing said it and Southwest are "preparing for delivery of the first airplane," and Boeing still expects that first delivery in 2027, according to Simple Flying. Southwest told The Points Guy it needs three to six months after delivery to get the plane into its operating specs, manuals, training programs and maintenance procedures before flying passengers on it. The airline's published schedule through March 2027 doesn't include a single Max 7 route.

Southwest also has to retrofit already-built Max 7s, which make up the bulk of roughly 40 Max 7 and Max 10 jets Boeing has sitting in inventory, with the carrier's new extra-legroom seating before those planes can fly, according to CNBC. In a statement to The Points Guy, Southwest called the certification "an important step toward continuing to modernize our all-Boeing 737 fleet," but stopped well short of promising a 2026 launch.

Why Wall Street cared anyway

Boeing shares still jumped 8% Monday, according to CNBC. Jefferies analyst Sheila Kahyaoglu noted the certification could help Boeing unlock cash from that stockpile of built-but-undelivered jets, since manufacturers collect the bulk of an aircraft's price at delivery, not at order. Boeing opened a fourth 737 Max production line in Everett, Washington in July as it works to ramp up output of both the Max and 787 Dreamliner.

The certification also builds on the FAA's mid-July decision to let Boeing resume issuing its own airworthiness certificates for the Max and 787, authority the agency stripped after the 2018 and 2019 crashes.

The next test is the Max 10, the largest jet in the family, which carriers also expected flying by 2020 and which is still awaiting FAA certification. Boeing's 777X, the company's largest jet program, remains in a separate certification queue as well. Both will show whether Monday's approval reflects a durable fix to Boeing's relationship with its regulator, or just the first domino in a long backlog finally clearing.