The Institut supérieur de l'aéronautique et de l'espace (French pronunciation: [ɛ̃stity sypeʁjœʁ də laeʁɔnotik e də lɛspas], ISAE-SUPAERO; lit. 'Higher Institute of Aeronautics and Space') is a French grande école of engineering, founded in 1909. It is the world's first dedicated institute of aerospace engineering. ISAE-SUPAERO is part of University of Toulouse, ISSAT, PEGASUS, GEA, Toulouse Tech, CESAER and Aerospace Valley. The institute is ranked highly among Europe's engineering schools.
Historically ISAE-SUPAERO resulted from the merger between SUPAERO and ENSICA in the summer of 2007. The aim of this move was to increase the international visibility of SUPAERO and the ENSICA (both of which depend on the French Ministry of Defense), by sharing their faculty and experimental means. The institute also delivers continuing education through its subsidiary, EUROSAE.
In 2011, ISAE founded Groupe ISAE with the engineering school, ENSMA. In 2012, Groupe ISAE was joined by ESTACA and by École de l'air et de l'espace, which trains officers of the French Air and Space Force. In January 2018, the Supméca, now called ISAE-SUPMECA, joined the group. In February 2022, the École nationale de l'aviation civile, the biggest European aviation university, also joined the group.
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History
Creation of ISAE in 2007
In June 2025, the school created the Toulouse School of Aviation and Aerospace Engineering in partnership with ENAC.
National rankings and acceptance rates
National ranking (ranked for its Master of Sciences in Engineering)
The undergraduate admission to ISAE-SUPAERO in the engineer cycle is made through two ways: the first pathway by which most students are recruited, is a very selective examination which requires at least two years of very intensive preparation after high school in classes préparatoires. The other pathway corresponds to the recruitment of about twenty undergraduate students from universities. For both ways, admission includes a week of written examinations during the spring followed by oral examinations that are handled in batches (séries) over the summer.
About only 200 students from classes préparatoires or French universities are admitted to the prestigious school each year.
The average acceptance rates of the national examination taken by students from classes préparatoires are indicated below:
Notable alumni
Notable alumni include:
Raoul Badin, S-1910, one of the main inventors of the airspeed indicator and forefather of instrument flying.
Henri Coandă, S-1910, discovered the Coandă Effect; Romanian designer of the first jet plane.
Henry Potez, S-1911, founder of the Potez airplanes company.
Mikhail Gurevich, S-1913, founder of MiG
Marcel Bloch-Dassault, S-1913, founder of the Dassault airplanes company.
René Couzinet, S-1925, aircraft designer, conceived the Couzinet 30 Arc-en-Ciel, the famous plane flown by Jean Mermoz, and also invented the retractable landing gear and the modern yoke.
Henri Ziegler, S-1931, father of the Airbus program.
Guy du Merle, S-1932, first director-general of the École nationale de l'aviation civile (French civil aviation university).
François Hussenot, S-1935, inventor of the "hussenographe" (an early form of Flight data recorder or "black box"); also involved in the creation of EPNER.
Jean-Claude Laprie (1944–2010), E-1968, director of research at the CNRS, former director of the LAAS-CNRS, silver medal of CNRS.
Serge Dassault, S-1951, CEO of Dassault Aviation.
Jacques Darricau, E-1961, an internationally recognized radar specialist, former president of EUROSAE and director of the SAE.