In the last five years, there has been an increased emphasis on the use of 2D and 3D PCbased flight simulators for flight training. Flight simulators allow users to practice certain skills and to stay current between flights in real aircraft. In addition, affordable PCbased flight simulators may be a viable, costeffective alternative for actual aircraft flight time or fully immersive, high fidelity simulators in the future. The research reported in this study examined the differences between flight simulator training on a limited fieldofview desktop monitor and training with an immersive virtual reality headmounted display (HMD). A between subjects design was used with thirty participants. Half of the participants performed designated flight protocols using the desktop monitor trainer and the other half performed the same flight protocols on the HMD immersive trainer. Participants using the desktop monitor performed significantly better than those in the HMD condition on tasks that involved maintaining altitude, pitch, bank, and heading. Possible explanations for these results include the “headsupâ€� nature of an HMD, resulting in less time viewing the aircraft instruments, and less familiarity with an HMD. Further research is needed to study performance differences between simulators with varying levels of fidelity. Research is also needed to study longitudinal effects of flight simulator training on real aircraft flight performance.