Embraer confirms next-generation turboprop project is cancelled for good
November 4, 2025
Embraer has confirmed that its long-mooted next-generation turboprop aircraft has been permanently cancelled, drawing a definitive line under one of its most discussed development programmes in recent years.
Speaking during the company’s third-quarter 2025 earnings call, CEO Francisco Gomes Neto told investors that the turboprop initiative had now been shelved entirely.
“The turboprop project or initiative has been cancelled by us,” he said. “We don’t have, at this point in time, any project or initiative in that direction anymore. It might change in the future, but at this point, the project has been cancelled.”
The statement ends years of speculation around Embraer’s planned clean-sheet regional turboprop, which was expected to compete with the ATR 72-600 and De Havilland Canada Dash 8-400.
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What Embraer’s next-generation turboprop would have offered
First unveiled in concept form in 2020, Embraer’s proposed aircraft would have seated around 70–90 passengers and featured rear-mounted engines to reduce cabin noise and improve aerodynamics.
It was pitched as a modern, fuel-efficient replacement for ageing regional fleets and aimed to capture a significant share of a market Embraer once dominated with its Brasilia and EMB-120 models.
The programme had struggled to secure launch partners and government backing, and Embraer increasingly turned its attention to electric and hybrid propulsion through its Eve Air Mobility spin-off and future regional-aircraft studies.
Embraer’s E175-E2 is still on the table
While the turboprop has been scrapped, Gomes Neto confirmed that the E175-E2 remains on hold rather than cancelled, pending regulatory changes in the United States.
“What is on hold is the E175-E2,” he said. “That one is on hold because of the scope clause in the US. If any change happens, then we will consider restoring the work on the E175-E2.”
The US scope clause limits the size and weight of aircraft that regional carriers can operate under contract to major airlines. Under current labour agreements, the E175-E2’s higher maximum take-off weight pushes it beyond those limits, making it ineligible for most regional jet operations in the country.
Embraer continues to build and sell the original E175-E1, which fits comfortably within scope-clause parameters and remains the mainstay of many US regional fleets.
Embraer moots new products but declines to commit to a single aisle airliner
Although the next-generation turboprop is off the table, Embraer made it clear in its earnings call that growth was very much in its future. The significant $31 billion backlog on its books assures that growth for the forseeable, but Embraer is looking further ahead, to the technologies and aircraft that will be demanded in decades from now.
The perennial question of a single aisle airliner to compete with Boeing and Airbus was presented to the executives, as it frequently is during results presentations. But Gomes Neto refused to be drawn.
“[A new product] could be an aircraft for executive aviation, commercial or defence aircraft,” he shared. “It could be something larger than the E195-E2, or it could be smaller. It could be a hybrid mid-sized aircraft. We haven’t yet defined what could be on our production lines.”
While Embraer either hasn’t decided on its next new product or is keeping very tight-lipped about the decision, it continues to invest in the technologies and competencies it will need to make the move when the market conditions are right.
“We are investing in new technologies because it’s important that we are prepared to make that decision when the time comes,” Gomes Neto added, noting Embraer’s work in alternative propulsion and its Eve AAM spinoff. “We have to have the technology readiness to react.”
