The logbook is the record that travels with the aircraft: hours flown, crew, fuel, technical occurrences, maintenance releases. Sooner or later every operator asks whether it can stop being paper.
It can — and the regulatory basis dates from 2017, with a reference model published in 2019. It is neither new nor an exception granted case by case.
What almost nobody explains properly is that there are two different acts: the system must be accepted by ANAC, and your operation must be authorized to use it. Confusing the two is what stalls migrations.
This page lays out the rules, the requirements and the process. If you already know all this and want to see the tool, go straight to the Alis digital logbook.
The regulatory basis: three rules, different functions
Almost every piece of market material cites "the logbook resolution" and "the systems resolution" in the same breath, as if they were one thing — and forgets the most specific rule of all.
Resolution No. 773/2025 — "Regulates the Logbook of Brazilian civil aircraft."
The rule for the document itself, in force since 01/01/2026: what must be recorded (art. 6 — thirteen items, from the crew to technical discrepancies), who signs and when, retention and availability. It is in art. 3 that it admits the digital medium — "The logbook may take a physical or digital form, and the integrity of the records must be ensured and any corrections to the information must be made evident". And in art. 4 is the rule that matters most: "The request to use a digital medium to record information must be submitted to ANAC", and digital records "must observe the rules established in a specific regulation on the use of computerized systems". That regulation is 458 — and it is why the system must be accepted by ANAC.
Resolution No. 458/2017 — "Regulates the use of computerized systems for recording and retaining information by ANAC-regulated entities."
This is not a logbook rule. It is the rule for systems, of general application (it also covers maintenance records, for example): it defines the security requirements a system must meet to replace paper in a mandatory record. Its Chapter II deals with the acceptance of use of these systems.
Portaria No. 3,220/SPO/SAR, of 10/15/2019 — "Establishes the reference model for the electronic logbook - eDB."
The eDB-specific rule, and the most operational of the three. It contains the reference model and Chapter VIII — "On the authorization to use the electronic logbook". It is in force, consolidated up to Portaria No. 15,103/SPO, of 07/24/2024.
A detail most guides get wrong: these rules have already been amended.
- 773/2025 — published 06/25/2025, in force since 01/01/2026. Guides written before then cite the previous logbook rule, which is no longer valid.
- 458/2017 — in force, amended by Resolution No. 511, of 04/11/2019 (which, among other points, added the definition of Blockchain) and by Resolution No. 678, of 05/04/2022 (alternatives for data retention).
- Portaria 3,220/2019 — amended by Portarias No. 1,528/SPO/SAR (2020), No. 14,096/SPO (2024) and No. 15,103/SPO (2024).
If the material behind your operation's decision cites the pre-2026 rule as current, it is out of date.
What Resolution 773 brought to the digital medium
773 is shorter than the previous rule and clearer about electronic records. Five points that change day-to-day life for those operating with an eDB:
- Integrity and traceable correction (art. 3). A correction does not erase: "must be made in such a way that it does not prevent the reading of the voided information". Silently overwriting is noncompliance, not convenience.
- Retention for the entire life of the aircraft and for at least 5 years and one day after the registration is canceled in the RAB (art. 3, § 1) — regardless of the medium.
- Pilot-in-command signature at the end of the flight or at the end of the duty period (art. 7), with the records for the last 30 days kept on board (art. 7, § 2).
- The operator's signature has a deadline — and is specific to the digital medium (art. 10, sole paragraph): after the PIC, the operator or a formally designated person signs within 2 days (RBAC 121), 15 days (RBAC 135) or 30 days (other operators). This is the new rule that most catches those who migrated without a process.
- Awareness of the technical status before the flight (art. 9): the operator makes available to the PIC the last and next maintenance intervention and the planned airframe hours — and awareness is attested by signature before the flight.
And the cost of getting it wrong is spelled out: absence, loss or corruption of the records is grounds for precautionary suspension of the Airworthiness Certificate (art. 12).
System acceptance vs. operator authorization
This is the distinction that resolves 90% of the confusion — and the reason why "the system is accepted" does not on its own answer the question ANAC asks.
1. The system must be accepted. Under Res. 458, the software must have its scope of use explicitly authorized by ANAC and meet the security requirements. This is the system vendor's responsibility, not yours.
2. Your operation must be authorized. Under Portaria 3,220, art. 48: "The operator wishing to use the eDB in place of the printed logbook must obtain approval prior to that substitution." And the authorization is issued in the operator's name, recorded in one of two possible ways:
- in the EO (Operations Specifications) — for aircraft listed in the EO of an operator certificated under RBAC No. 119;
- in an LOA (Letter of Authorization) — for all other aircraft.
This is where the question "do I need an LOA?" gets an objective answer: if your aircraft is not in the EO of a certificated 119 operator, the instrument is the LOA. General aviation and private operations, in practice, take this path.
3. Once authorized, the clock starts. Art. 49: the operator has a period of up to 30 days to carry out the migration. This changes planning — the cutover date is not a free, open-ended choice; it is tied to the authorization.
Alis supports the operation through this formalization process, including organizing the required documentation.
What the system must deliver
Res. 458 is information security applied to regulatory records. In practice, a system that replaces the paper logbook must sustain four things:
Authentication and signature. Whoever made the entry must be unambiguously identifiable, with a valid signature. A shared login does not meet this.
Integrity. A posted record cannot be silently altered. Correction is possible — as a new traceable event, never as an invisible overwrite.
Audit trail. The system must be able to answer who posted, when, and what has changed since. This is the item that most often fails spreadsheets and homegrown systems.
Retention and availability. The information must be preserved and available when requested — in an inspection, in an audit, at the sale of the aircraft.
Paper vs. electronic: what really changes
The gain is not saving paper. It is the data being born structured.
On paper, the hour flown is written on board, retyped later into a maintenance tracking spreadsheet and retyped again into an expense report. Three entries, three chances of divergence — and none of them warns you when they diverge.
In the electronic version, the posted flight updates the airframe and component hours, moves the projected due date of the next inspection and feeds the aircraft history all at once. That is why an operation with an electronic logbook and integrated maintenance tracking (CTM) finds out about a due date earlier, and not on the ramp.
The reverse also holds: an electronic logbook that does not talk to maintenance tracking solves half the problem and creates a second database to reconcile.
And the entry can create itself. The aircraft's transponder broadcasts the flight in progress (ADS-B), and the RAB publishes the code that links the registration to that trace. Alis uses both to create the draft of the entry — date, times and estimated airports filled in — and the pilot reviews, completes and posts it. The draft does not add hours or move due dates until it is posted: how the ADS-B pre-filled flight works.
How to move off paper
The path has four moves: choose an ANAC-accepted system, obtain the authorization (EO or LOA), migrate within the deadline with a defined cutover date, and train those who will make the entries.
What derails a migration is almost never the rule — it is execution. The errors that show up most: running paper and system in parallel indefinitely (and ending up with two truths), migrating without bringing over the hours history, adopting a system without an audit trail, and forgetting the technical maintenance record along the way.
Full breakdown: how ANAC acceptance works and what your operation needs to do — with the 4 errors in detail and a migration checklist.
Contingency: what to do when the system is unavailable
A question every serious operator asks and almost no market material answers: what if it fails?
An operation that depends on electronic records needs a contingency procedure written before it is needed, covering: how to record during the outage, how quickly and by whom the record is entered into the system when it returns, and how that gap stays traceable instead of becoming a hole in the history.
A system that treats unavailability as an unforeseen event — and not as an anticipated scenario — pushes the problem onto the captain at the worst possible moment.
Audit: what is requested, and how fast you respond
The electronic logbook only pays off the investment on inspection day. What is requested is always similar: logbooks for the period, reconciled hours, maintenance releases with an identifiable signature, occurrences recorded and closed, a consistent history.
The difference between the operation that responds in minutes and the one that responds in all-nighters is not last-minute effort — it is where the information lives day to day.
And a warning from someone who has seen it up close: posting entries afterward "to get through" is not a shortcut. It is a finding.
Related reading: SMS in practice and CTM without spreadsheets.
How much it costs
Transparency here is a differentiator: most of the industry's material talks about savings without showing a price.
Alis plans start at R$ 149/month per aircraft, with the digital logbook already in the entry plan and CTM in the higher plans.
Compare that with the real cost of paper: retyping rework, hours reconciliation, audit preparation time and the unplanned grounding nobody saw coming.
Next step
If your operation still depends on paper, spreadsheets or a system without an audit trail, the conversation is quick — and the day-to-day after it looks like this: the flight can be submitted by WhatsApp message, and the assistant posts it in the logbook.
Regulatory sources
- ANAC Resolution No. 773, of 06/25/2025 — Logbook of Brazilian civil aircraft (in force since 01/01/2026)
- ANAC Resolution No. 458, of 12/20/2017 — Computerized systems for recording and retaining information (in force, amended by Res. 511/2019 and 678/2022)
- ANAC Portaria No. 3,220/SPO/SAR, of 10/15/2019 — Reference model for the electronic logbook (eDB), consolidated up to Portaria No. 15,103/SPO, of 07/24/2024