Go around when the approach stops being stabilized, when you won’t be on the ground in the first third of the runway, or when the airplane bounces hard enough that you no longer know what it’s about to do. Those three cover most of the landings that should be abandoned in a light single. The maneuver itself is easy to fly. Deciding in time is what takes discipline.
The FAA says the same thing in blunter language. From the Airplane Flying Handbook’s Chapter 9, Approaches and Landings (FAA-H-8083-3C): “The go-around maneuver is not inherently dangerous in itself. It becomes dangerous only when delayed unduly or executed improperly.”
Why the decision is the hard part
The handbook then names the psychology. Delay in going around, it says, comes from two sources: landing expectancy, “the anticipatory belief that conditions are not as threatening as they are and that the approach is sure to terminate with a safe landing,” and pride, “the mistaken belief that the act of going around is an admission of failure.”
The first three items on that chapter’s list of common go-around errors: failure to recognize a condition that warrants a rejected landing, indecision, delay. None of those are stick-and-rudder problems.
So the triggers belong on your checklist as numbers. Under 14 CFR 91.3(a) you’re the final authority on the operation of the aircraft, which means nobody is going to hand you a gate. At a towered field you fly the airplane first and tell the tower after.
Unstable approach criteria worth writing down
“Stabilized” has real numbers behind it. For a typical piston airplane, the handbook lists a constant glide path of about 3 degrees to the touchdown zone, centerline tracking with only minor heading and pitch corrections and bank normally limited to 15 degrees once established on final, airspeed within +10/-5 knots of the AFM landing speed or 1.3 VSO, the correct landing configuration in trim, a descent rate generally 500 to 1,000 fpm and reduced below 500 fpm before 300 feet AGL, a power setting no lower than the AFM approach minimum, and every briefing and checklist except the landing checklist already done.
Two more numbers from that section are the ones I’d put on the page. Pilots normally go around if they can’t establish a stabilized approach by 500 feet above airport elevation in VMC, or 1,000 feet in IMC. And for a typical general aviation piston airplane in the traffic pattern, “an immediate go-around should be initiated if the approach becomes unstabilized below 300 ft AGL.”
Three hundred feet is the gate that does the most work in a pattern. Below it you’re out of altitude to fix anything, and every correction happens while the airplane gets slower.
The triggers that show up in the last twenty feet
Not every go-around announces itself on final. The handbook is specific about the late ones:
- Long float. “If a landing cannot be made on the first third of the runway, or the airplane drifts sideways, execute a go-around.” AOPA teaches the same rule of thumb in its presolo go-around lesson.
- High round out. Hold the pitch attitude and let it decelerate. But the handbook adds a catch-all: go around “any time it appears the nose needs to be lowered significantly or that the landing is in any other way uncertain.”
- Excessive ballooning. Go around immediately without trying to salvage it, applying power before the airplane reaches a stalled condition.
- Doubt about the surface. Wrong-surface avoidance gets one sentence: if there’s doubt about the landing surface, go around and think about it.
- A worsening porpoise. Pilot-induced oscillations that keep growing damage or collapse nose gear.
Bounced landing recovery
Search any pilot forum for bounced landings and the same two answers come back. One instructor’s version of the cause: the number one reason for bounced landings is too much speed on final. The handbook agrees by a different route: excessive approach speed produces floating, and in a float “the slightest error in judgment and timing results in either ballooning or bouncing.”
The recovery splits on severity. A very slight bounce with no extreme pitch change can become a follow-up landing: enough power to cushion the second touchdown, pitch smoothly to the proper landing attitude, and hold your crosswind correction, because the next touchdown happens slower and the upwind wing needs to go down further.
A severe bounce gets one answer. Full power, directional control, nose lowered to a safe climb attitude, and continue the go-around even if the airplane settles and bounces a second time. The handbook says not to attempt to salvage the landing, and explains why: airspeed drops very fast in that nose-high attitude, so a stall can arrive before the next touchdown does.
The other thing forums keep repeating is that low-time pilots shouldn’t be sorting “slight” from “severe” in a quarter of a second, so a bounce means go around, full stop. That’s a good personal rule for a while.
The go-around flow: power, attitude, configuration
The handbook gives three cardinal principles in that order, and the order is the whole procedure.
Power. The instant you decide, full or maximum allowable takeoff power, applied smoothly and without hesitation, held until flying speed and controllability are back. Carburetor heat off if you have it. Smooth matters: an abrupt throttle shove makes some engines falter.
Attitude. You are trimmed for a low airspeed, so the sudden power tries to pitch you up and yaw you left. Expect to need considerable forward elevator pressure and a bootful of right rudder. Resist the urge to pitch for a climb you don’t have the speed for; sometimes you lower the nose briefly to get it. Rough-trim once it’s flying, then fine-trim later.
Configuration. Flaps come next, after the climb attitude and power are set, retracted partially or to the takeoff setting per your manufacturer, in small increments so the airplane accelerates as they come up. Then the gear, after a positive rate of climb and only once you’re certain the airplane will stay airborne. Flaps before gear, because full flaps usually make more drag than the gear does, and if you touch down mid-go-around you want the wheels down and locked.
One trap: ground effect. Close to the runway that apparent cushion under the wings is borrowed performance from reduced induced drag, and it gets repaid on the way up. Climb prematurely and the airplane may not climb at all at full power.
That sequence is a memorized flow, not something you read. It’s the flows-then-checklists split exactly: hands do the work from a practiced pattern, and the page exists for before and after.
Put the gates on the page
The flow lives in your hands. The triggers live on your checklist. On mine, the Before Landing section carries five lines of go-around gates in my numbers for the airplane I’m flying: target final speed, stabilized by 500 feet, immediate go-around below 300, down in the first third or go, bounce means go. They’re there because reading them on the ground twenty times is how they end up available at 200 feet. A checkride binder is a good place to keep them next to your own weak-spot list.
Practice them deliberately, including from low altitude with an instructor aboard. Go-Around/Rejected Landing is Task N in Area of Operation IV of the Private Pilot ACS, so it’s coming regardless. For the page itself, how to build a checklist covers the design side, the Cessna 172 template is a starting point to customize in the editor, and the student pilot hub has the free FAA handbooks.
Set your speeds and flap settings from your airplane’s current POH/AFM, not from this post, and have your CFI check the gates you write down before you fly to them.
Common questions
When should you go around?
Go around any time the approach stops being stabilized, and immediately if it goes unstable below 300 feet AGL. Also go around if you won't touch down in the first third of the runway, if the airplane is drifting sideways at the round out, if you'd have to lower the nose significantly to salvage the landing, if you're not certain the surface ahead is the right runway, or if the airplane bounces or balloons badly. The Airplane Flying Handbook names all of those explicitly.
How do you recover from a bounced landing?
It depends on severity. For a very slight bounce with no big pitch change, add enough power to cushion the next touchdown and smoothly set the correct landing attitude, holding your crosswind correction the whole time. When the bounce is severe, the handbook says go around immediately and do not try to salvage the landing: full power, directional control, nose to a safe climb attitude, and keep going even if the airplane settles and bounces again.
What are the stabilized approach criteria for a light airplane?
For a typical piston airplane the Airplane Flying Handbook lists roughly a 3-degree glide path to the touchdown zone, centerline tracking with only minor heading and pitch corrections and bank normally under 15 degrees, airspeed within +10/-5 knots of the AFM landing speed or 1.3 VSO, correct landing configuration and trim, a descent rate generally 500 to 1,000 fpm reduced to under 500 fpm before 300 feet AGL, a power setting no lower than the AFM approach minimum, and all briefings and checklists done except the landing checklist.
Do you retract the flaps or the landing gear first in a go-around?
Unless your AFM or POH says otherwise, flaps come up at least partially before the gear. Full flaps make more drag than the gear on most airplanes, and if the airplane touches down during the go-around you want the gear down and locked. Retract flaps in small increments so the airplane can accelerate, and raise the gear only after a positive rate of climb and once you're sure the airplane will stay airborne.
Is going around a sign that you flew a bad approach?
No. The Airplane Flying Handbook calls the go-around a normal maneuver and specifically calls the belief that an aborted landing means insufficient skill a fallacy. Traffic on the runway, wake turbulence, wind shear, and a tower instruction all produce go-arounds that have nothing to do with how you flew the approach.