Boeing had a good Tuesday. A very good Tuesday. On 29 September 2026 the Pentagon handed the company the Navy’s sixth-generation F/A-XX fighter, and on the very same day the Department of the Air Force quietly signed for 22 more F-15EX Eagle II fighters. One contract is about the 2030s. The other is about jets you can actually fly next year.
The Lot 7 deal is worth $2.38 billion, according to Boeing, and it takes the total number of F-15EXs on contract to 120 across seven production lots. Divide the money by the jets and you land at roughly $108 million per aircraft, a figure Air & Space Forces Magazine points out does not include engines, which the Air Force buys separately.
It also beat the clock. The Air Force says its negotiators kept all 22 aircraft inside the available funding before the fiscal-year deadline, which in Pentagon land is 30 September. Miss it and the money gets a lot harder to spend.
Informations clés
- Contracter: F-15EX Eagle II Lot 7, awarded 29 September 2026
- Contractor: Boeing, St. Louis
- Quantity: 22 aircraft
- Valeur: $2.38 billion (engines bought separately)
- Total on contract: 120 F-15EXs across Lots 1 to 7
- Remplace : Ageing F-15C/D Eagles
- Production goal: Two aircraft per month, per Boeing
What the Air Force actually bought
The F-15EX is the newest member of a family that first flew in 1972, but the only thing it really shares with the original Eagle is the silhouette. It has digital fly-by-wire flight controls, an all-glass touchscreen cockpit and new mission systems, all wrapped around two General Electric F110 engines. The Air Force is buying it to replace its worn-out F-15C and F-15D fleet.
The negotiation was not simple. According to the Air Force, the Lot 7 agreement had to absorb the impact of a production disruption in 2025 and the inflation currently running through the defence industry. The service still got all 22 jets it wanted.
Col. Jonathan Varoli, who runs the F-15 program office, called it an effort that “brought together the right expertise, at the right time.” Translation: a lot of people worked very late in September.
From test jets to a real fleet
The first F-15EX was handed over in March 2021 and went to Eglin Air Force Base in Florida for testing. The Oregon Air National Guard’s 142nd Wing in Portland became the first operational unit in 2024, and Kadena Air Base in Japan has started receiving the type as the Air Force replaces the Eagles it has flown from Okinawa since 1979.
Boeing says it has just delivered F-15EX-22, the first aircraft from Lot 3, with more Lot 3 jets due before the end of 2026. The company wants to get the St. Louis line up to two aircraft a month. At the moment, the backlog is doing a lot of the talking.
Christina Upah, Boeing’s vice president for the F-15 program, kept it short: Boeing, she said, is committed to delivering this critically important aircraft to the U.S. Air Force. With F/A-XX and the F-47 now also landing in St. Louis, the question is less whether Boeing is committed and more whether one factory town can build three fighters at once.
Why this matters
The United States currently runs three active fighter production lines: the F-35, the F-16 and the F-15EX. Only one of them builds a big, fast, heavy-lifting fighter that can haul an enormous weapons load, and that one just got a fresh batch of orders. For an air force that keeps saying it has too few fighters, 22 more is not a rounding error.
It is also a reminder that the future of air power is not only stealthy robots and sixth-generation jets. Sometimes it is a 50-year-old shape with a brand-new brain, coming off the line a couple of times a month.
Boeing’s own footage of F-15EX EX17 moving into final assembly in St. Louis.
Sources: U.S. Department of the Air Force, Boeing, Air & Space Forces Magazine, Defence Industry Europe
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