What is ATA iSpec 2200?

ATA iSpec 2200, Information Standards for Aviation Maintenance, is the airline industry's specification for the content, structure, and exchange of aircraft engineering and maintenance information. Airlines for America (A4A) publishes it and describes it as "a global aviation industry standard for the content, structure, and electronic exchange" of that information, made up of a suite of data specifications on maintenance requirements and procedures and on aircraft configuration control. The current revision is 2025.1. The specification is where the ATA chapter numbers come from, it is the descendant of ATA Spec 100 and Spec 2100, and it shares an ancestor and a publisher with S1000D. This post covers who publishes it, what it contains, the numbering system, the manuals it shapes, how it compares with S1000D, and where military programs meet it.

Who publishes iSpec 2200: A4A and the ATA e-Business Program

The publisher's legal name explains the acronym. The copyright line on every A4A publications page reads Air Transport Association of America, Inc., doing business as Airlines for America, and the specifications keep the ATA prefix. They are developed inside the ATA e-Business Program, which describes itself as the place where the global commercial aviation industry collaborates on standards for information exchange supporting engineering, maintenance, materiel management, and flight operations. The program's home page lists iSpec 2200, Spec 2000, S1000D, Spec 1000BR, Spec 42, and Spec 2300 as its publications.

The program's About page says the industry has worked for more than 60 years through a joint international effort to establish specifications for business processes and information exchange, that the specifications are administered and published by the ATA e-Business Program, and that members include airlines, lessors, aerospace manufacturers, distributors, suppliers, repair agencies, software providers, and consultants. The standards page lists every specification the program maintains, with the working group responsible for each. iSpec 2200 and the iSpec 2200 Extract are maintained by the Technical Data Working Group, which the page also names, as the Technical Data Working Group / Civil Aviation Working Group, as the body that represents the civil aviation industry in S1000D.

Access is split between members and buyers. Every A4A product page carries the note that members of the ATA e-Business Program have access to the specification and all other ATA e-business specifications for free. Everyone else buys it. The 2025.1 product page lists a single-user license at $2,815 and a multi-user license at $6,029, and the e-Biz collection shows the catalog for sale, including the Common Support Data Dictionary, iSpec 2200 and its extract, Spec 100 at its 1999 revision, the Spec 2000 chapters, Spec 2300, Spec 2500, and the World Airlines and Supplier Guide.

What iSpec 2200 covers

The A4A description is the authoritative public summary of the contents, since the specification itself is sold. iSpec 2200 consists of a suite of data specifications pertaining to maintenance requirements and procedures and aircraft configuration control. The objective, in A4A's words, is to minimize the cost and effort expended by operators and manufacturers, improve information quality and timeliness, and help manufacturers deliver data that meets airline operational needs. It includes the industry-wide standard for numbering aircraft systems, and content and electronic formatting specifications for technical documents "regardless of delivery medium." Document type definitions (DTDs) are included; the ATA e-Business standards page specifies that these are Standard Generalized Markup Language (SGML) DTDs.

A purchase also includes an extract from the Common Support Data Dictionary for the entries that pertain to iSpec 2200. The CSDD, at Revision 2025.1 with an original issue in 1997, is the catalog of all data elements, terms, and tags used throughout the ATA specifications, meant to give standardized names, definitions, and properties for data used within the air transport industry. The ATA standards page adds that definitions formerly kept in the World Airlines Technical Operations Glossary are now part of the CSDD.

The revision history on the product page shows a specification that changes most years. The original issue was 2000.1, followed by 2001.1 through 2012.1, a 2012.2, then 2014.1, 2016.1, 2017.1, 2018.1, 2021.1, 2023.1, 2024.1, and 2025.1. The 2025.1 highlights are narrow and technical: missing required attributes were added to the component maintenance manual (CMM) DTD, and other attributes were harmonized across all DTDs. That is typical of a mature specification whose structure is settled and whose maintenance consists of keeping the DTDs consistent.

ATA 100, ATA 2100, and the 2000 merger

Searchers type "ATA 100 chapters" because the chapter numbers predate iSpec 2200 by decades. A4A still sells ATA Spec 100, Manufacturers Technical Data, at its 1999 revision, with an original issue of 1956. The product page says it contains format and content guidelines for technical manuals written by aviation manufacturers and suppliers, used by airlines and other segments of the industry in maintaining their products, and that it provides the industry-wide standard for aircraft systems numbering, "often referred to as ATA system or chapter numbers." The format and content guidelines define data prepared as conventional printed documentation.

The iSpec 2200 product page says the industry developed the consolidated specification "recognizing the synergies between ATA Spec 100 and Spec 2100," and that in 2000 both were incorporated into ATA iSpec 2200. Neither will be updated beyond the 1999 revision level. The ATA e-Business standards page lists Spec 100 under the heading No Longer Updated, says the two were replaced by iSpec 2200, and lists beside it Spec 101, Ground Equipment Technical Data, a specification for the presentation of technical data on ground equipment that is also no longer updated.

The ATA 100 lineage matters beyond the airlines. The S1000D About page says that in the early 1980s most civil airline projects were documented to ATA 100, that the European working group which started S1000D recognized ATA 100 as "the only internationally accepted specification in the aerospace field," and that it set out to harmonize civil and military documentation with ATA 100 as a source. When a program office sees a manual organized by ATA chapter, it is looking at the numbering of a specification first issued in 1956, carried forward through iSpec 2200.

ATA chapter numbering: the Standard Numbering System

The chapter numbers are sold on their own. The iSpec 2200 Extract, ATA Standard Numbering System, at Revision 2024.1, provides "the industry-wide standard for numbering aircraft systems," and the product page notes the extract was originally titled ATA iSpec 2200: Aircraft Systems. The 2024.1 revision removed Table 3-1-3.5, Definitions of Aircraft Groups, Systems, and Subsystems, from the document and replaced it with an Excel file in the download package. Earlier extract revisions were 2010.1, 2011.1, 2014.1, 2016.1, 2017.1, 2018.1, and 2023.1.

Because the extract is a paid document, the public detail of what each chapter covers comes from the FAA. The Joint Aircraft System/Component (JASC) code table, last updated October 27, 2008, calls itself "a modified version of the Air Transport Association of America (ATA), Specification 100 code." The FAA introduced the four-digit JASC format in May 1991 to classify service difficulty reports, replacing an eight-digit code, and says that in some cases JASC matches the first three digits of the ATA code, which identify aircraft systems, with the fourth digit used for components. The table runs 488 codes.

The JASC table lets a reader see the chapter structure:

The FAA notes its own departures from ATA Spec 100: turbine engines are in chapter 72 and reciprocating engines in chapter 85, and the stall warning system moved from ATA section 2730 to JASC code 3418 under navigation. A fuller walk through the chapters, including how the FAA uses ATA codes in airworthiness directives, is in the post on ATA chapter numbers.

The manuals iSpec 2200 shapes

iSpec 2200 is a specification for documents, not a document itself, and A4A describes its output as technical documents regardless of delivery medium, with a DTD for each. The one manual type named on the public product page is the component maintenance manual, through the CMM DTD in the 2025.1 highlights. The specification's chapter numbering organizes the aircraft maintenance manual and the other publications a manufacturer delivers, but the full list of document types is inside the paid specification and is not reproduced here.

Regulators show how the specification is used. The FAA's Airworthiness Directive Implementation Aviation Rulemaking Committee, in a working group report approved on February 15, 2011, said the aviation industry has specifications to define the format, content, and location of material in service documents, named them as S1000D and ATA iSpec 2200, and noted that the five design approval holders supporting the committee used both to standardize the location, content, and format of material in their service documents. The United Kingdom Civil Aviation Authority's guidance material GM2 21.A.7(b) on the format of instructions for continued airworthiness says applicants may use the latest ATA, ASD, or GAMA formatting standards and lists ASD S1000D version 4 or higher, ATA iSpec 2200 in its latest edition, and GAMA Specification No. 2. The same guidance mentions the aircraft maintenance manual (AMM) and troubleshooting manual (TSM) as examples of a principal document and a subject that may be integrated into it.

The regulatory floor underneath these manuals is Appendix H to 14 CFR Part 25, Instructions for Continued Airworthiness. It requires the instructions to be in the form of a manual or manuals with a practical arrangement, prepared in English, and to contain an airplane maintenance manual or section with a description of the airplane and its systems, control and operation information, and servicing information; maintenance instructions with scheduling, troubleshooting, removal and replacement, and other procedural information; diagrams of structural access plates; details of special inspection techniques; protective treatment information; structural fastener data; and an Airworthiness Limitations section. Appendix H does not name iSpec 2200. The specification is the industry's way of meeting it in a consistent form.

iSpec 2200 vs S1000D

The two specifications share a publisher and an ancestor and differ in form. iSpec 2200 defines documents with SGML DTDs and the ATA numbering system; S1000D, the subject of a separate post, defines data modules written in XML and stored in a common source database, assembled into publications. The S1000D organizational structure page says the S1000D Council was formed under a memorandum of understanding among ASD, the Aerospace Industries Association, and the ATA e-Business Program, and that the Civil Aviation Working Group, managed by the ATA e-Business Program, is the S1000D representative body for the worldwide civil aviation industry. The ATA standards page describes the same arrangement from its side: S1000D is maintained jointly by ATA, AIA, and ASD, and the Technical Data Working Group / Civil Aviation Working Group represents civil aviation interests in it.

Access differs. The A4A S1000D page offers S1000D as a free download under the S1000D terms and conditions, while iSpec 2200 is sold. The ATA e-Business Program bridges the two with ATA Spec 1000BR, the civil aviation business rules for S1000D. That page says S1000D is designed to allow tailoring through project-specific business rules and that Spec 1000BR provides the rules and additional guidance for implementing S1000D in civil aviation. Each version corresponds to an S1000D issue: Spec 1000BR_4.1, 1000BR_4.2, and 1000BR_6 are listed at Revision 2026.1, while Issue 4.0 and earlier, Issue 5.0, and Issue 7 are shown as not supported for civil aviation use.

For a reader comparing the two, the practical questions are which one the manufacturer delivered, whether the data is SGML documents or XML data modules, and whether the chapter numbering in the deliverable is the ATA Standard Numbering System or an S1000D standard numbering system defined in the project's business rules. An airline fleet is likely to be iSpec 2200; a defense program started this century is likely to be S1000D; a commercial derivative aircraft in military service can be either, depending on what the manufacturer built for the civil type certificate.

How military programs use ATA chapters

Commercial derivative aircraft (CDA) are where defense maintenance meets iSpec 2200 directly. Chapter 11 of the Naval Aviation Maintenance Program (NAMP), COMNAVAIRFORINST 4790.2E dated October 28, 2024, says the Navy and Marine Corps have used CDA to meet logistics and passenger-carrying needs and increasingly other missions, and that CDA applying FAA-approved civil maintenance plans "offer significant life-cycle cost savings to the government." The Navy seeks to have its CDA comply with civil airworthiness standards to the extent practicable, and NAVAIR uses FAA airworthiness artifacts and FAA-approved maintenance plans wherever practicable. The program manager decides whether an original equipment manufacturer maintenance plan, an organic plan, or a combination is most cost-effective, and where an approved manufacturer plan exists, may implement best commercial practices in lieu of the NAMP. The FAA Military Certification Office handles type certification projects for military CDA programs. A manufacturer's FAA-approved maintenance data arrives in the form the manufacturer built for the civil type certificate; the FAA working group report cited above found the five design approval holders supporting its committee using S1000D and iSpec 2200.

The DoD format standards anticipate commercial manuals. MIL-STD-38784B, the general style and format standard dated November 16, 2020, says supplements normally conform to the style of the existing manual except commercial manual supplements, which follow the standard's own style and format, and lists MIL-PRF-32216, Evaluation of Commercial Off-the-Shelf Manuals and Preparation of Supplemental Data, among its applicable documents. The Army's MIL-STD-3031, the business rules for S1000D dated September 30, 2009, has a section on supplemental data for commercial off-the-shelf manuals: if an evaluation under MIL-PRF-32216 finds that a commercial manual needs supplemental data, the supplement is prepared as S1000D data modules using the information codes in the standard's content selection matrix, rather than by rewriting the commercial manual.

The pattern is to keep the manufacturer's manual, organized by ATA chapter, and add a military supplement around it. A reviewer who understands the chapter numbering can therefore move between a commercial maintenance manual, an FAA code in a service difficulty report, and a military supplement without a crosswalk.

What to check

• Which revision of iSpec 2200 does the manufacturer's data follow? A4A lists 2025.1 as current and the numbering extract at 2024.1.
• Is the deliverable iSpec 2200 SGML documents or S1000D XML data modules, and if S1000D, which issue and which Spec 1000BR revision apply?
• Does the manual's chapter numbering follow the ATA Standard Numbering System, and where it departs from the FAA's JASC codes, such as chapters 72 and 85 for engines, is the difference documented?
• For a commercial derivative aircraft, has the program office decided whether best commercial practices under an approved manufacturer maintenance plan apply in lieu of the NAMP, as Chapter 11 of COMNAVAIRFORINST 4790.2E provides?
• Were commercial manuals evaluated under MIL-PRF-32216, and do any supplements follow MIL-STD-38784 or MIL-STD-3031 as required?
• Does the data include the Common Support Data Dictionary extract, so that element names and definitions can be checked against the ATA catalog?

Azcuna's TRACE is one offline viewer for S1000D, MIL-STD-3001 XML, and PDF technical manuals. It keeps the source location and the markings of everything it shows and never modifies the source. It was proposed to NAVAIR under Navy SBIR Phase I topic DON26BZ05-NV078, and the proposal was submitted on September 23, 2026.

Questions people ask

What is ATA iSpec 2200?

ATA iSpec 2200, Information Standards for Aviation Maintenance, is the airline industry specification for aircraft engineering and maintenance information. The Airlines for America product page describes it as a global aviation industry standard for the content, structure, and electronic exchange of that information, consisting of a suite of data specifications on maintenance requirements and procedures and aircraft configuration control. It includes the industry-wide standard for numbering aircraft systems, content and formatting specifications for technical documents regardless of delivery medium, and document type definitions.

Who publishes iSpec 2200?

Airlines for America, legally the Air Transport Association of America doing business as Airlines for America, through its ATA e-Business Program. The program's standards page lists iSpec 2200 and the iSpec 2200 Extract among the specifications it develops and maintains and says the Technical Data Working Group maintains both. The A4A publications store sells the full specification, at $2,815 for a single user at Revision 2025.1, and says members of the ATA e-Business Program get it and all other ATA e-business specifications free.

What is the current revision of iSpec 2200?

Revision 2025.1, according to the Airlines for America product page, whose revision history runs 2000.1, the original issue, through 2001.1, 2002.1, 2003.1, 2004.1, 2005.1, 2006.1, 2007.1, 2008.1, 2009.1, 2010.1, 2011.1, 2012.1, 2012.2, 2014.1, 2016.1, 2017.1, 2018.1, 2021.1, 2023.1, 2024.1, and 2025.1. The 2025.1 highlights add missing required attributes to the component maintenance manual DTD and harmonize attributes across all DTDs. The separately sold numbering extract is at Revision 2024.1.

What was ATA 100?

ATA Spec 100, Manufacturers Technical Data, was the original airline specification for technical manuals. The Airlines for America product page says it contains format and content guidelines for technical manuals written by aviation manufacturers and suppliers, used by airlines in maintaining their products, defines data prepared as conventional printed documentation, and provides the industry-wide standard for aircraft systems numbering, the ATA chapter numbers. The original issue was 1956. In 2000 it was incorporated into iSpec 2200 and frozen at the 1999 revision.

What is ATA Spec 2100?

ATA Spec 2100 was the second specification merged into iSpec 2200. The Airlines for America product page for iSpec 2200 says that in 2000 ATA Spec 100 and ATA Spec 2100 were incorporated into ATA iSpec 2200 and that neither will be updated beyond the 1999 revision level, and the ATA e-Business Program's standards page says the two were replaced by iSpec 2200. The same product page describes iSpec 2200 as recognizing the synergies between Spec 100 and Spec 2100 in a consolidated specification that includes document type definitions.

What are ATA chapters?

ATA chapters are the two-digit codes under which aircraft systems are numbered in maintenance documentation, such as 21 for air conditioning, 32 for landing gear, and 72 for turbine engines. The Airlines for America extract page says the ATA Standard Numbering System in iSpec 2200 is the industry-wide standard for numbering aircraft systems, often referred to as system or chapter numbers. The FAA's Joint Aircraft System/Component code table, a modified version of the ATA Spec 100 code, is the public source for what each chapter covers.

Is iSpec 2200 free?

Not to the public. The Airlines for America publications store lists Revision 2025.1 at $2,815 for a single-user license and $6,029 for a multi-user license, and the numbering extract at Revision 2024.1 at $400 for a single user. Members of the ATA e-Business Program have free access to iSpec 2200 and all other ATA e-business specifications, according to the product pages. By contrast, S1000D, which the same program co-produces, is free to download from the A4A S1000D page under the S1000D terms and conditions.

What is the difference between iSpec 2200 and S1000D?

iSpec 2200 is the airline industry standard for maintenance information, with document type definitions and the ATA chapter numbering, sold by Airlines for America. S1000D is the international specification for technical publications built from XML data modules in a common source database, produced jointly by ASD, AIA, and the ATA e-Business Program and free to download. The s1000d.org About page says S1000D was harmonized using ATA 100 as a source, and the ATA e-Business Program publishes Spec 1000BR, the civil aviation business rules for S1000D.

Do military aircraft use ATA chapters?

Commercial derivative aircraft do. The Naval Aviation Maintenance Program, COMNAVAIRFORINST 4790.2E of October 28, 2024, says commercial derivative aircraft applying FAA-approved civil maintenance plans offer significant life-cycle cost savings and that the program office may implement best commercial practices in lieu of the NAMP where an approved manufacturer maintenance plan exists. MIL-STD-38784B requires commercial manual supplements to follow its style and format, and MIL-STD-3031 covers supplemental data for commercial off-the-shelf manuals evaluated under MIL-PRF-32216.

What is the ATA Common Support Data Dictionary?

The Common Support Data Dictionary (CSDD) is the catalog of data elements, terms, and tags used throughout the ATA specifications. The Airlines for America product page says its purpose is to provide standardized names, definitions, and properties for data used in the air transport industry, and that the current revision is 2025.1, with an original issue in 1997. The iSpec 2200 product page says a purchase of iSpec 2200 automatically includes an extract of the CSDD entries that pertain to it.

Sources

1. 1iSpec 2200: Information Standards for Aviation Maintenance, Revision 2025.1 · Airlines for America Publications
2. 2iSpec 2200 Extract: ATA Standard Numbering System, Revision 2024.1 · Airlines for America Publications
3. 3Spec 100: Manufacturers Technical Data, Revision 1999 · Airlines for America Publications
4. 4Common Support Data Dictionary (CSDD), Revision 2025.1 · Airlines for America Publications
5. 5Spec1000BR: Civil Aviation Business Rules for S1000D · Airlines for America Publications
6. 6S1000D: International Specification for Technical Publications · Airlines for America Publications
7. 7e-Biz collection · Airlines for America Publications
8. 8Standards · Airlines for America, ATA e-Business Program
9. 9About Us · Airlines for America, ATA e-Business Program
10. 10ATA e-Business Program · Airlines for America, ATA e-Business Program
11. 11About S1000D · S1000D Council and Steering Committee (s1000d.org)
12. 12S1000D Organizational Structure · S1000D Council and Steering Committee (s1000d.org)
13. 13Joint Aircraft System/Component Code Table and Definitions · Federal Aviation Administration, Flight Standards Service, October 27, 2008
14. 14Airworthiness Directive Implementation Aviation Rulemaking Committee, Service Information Working Group, Simplified Service Bulletin Format (A2-9) · Federal Aviation Administration, approved February 15, 2011
15. 1514 CFR Part 25, Appendix H, Instructions for Continued Airworthiness (2024 edition) · U.S. Government Publishing Office, govinfo
16. 16GM2 21.A.7(b) Instructions for Continued Airworthiness - format (ORS9 Decision No. 48) · United Kingdom Civil Aviation Authority
17. 17The Naval Aviation Maintenance Program (NAMP), COMNAVAIRFORINST 4790.2E, 28 Oct 2024 · Commander, Naval Air Forces
18. 18MIL-STD-38784B, General Style and Format Requirements for Technical Manuals · Department of Defense, November 16, 2020, via EverySpec
19. 19MIL-STD-3031, Army Business Rules for S1000D · Department of the Army, September 30, 2009, via EverySpec

Where this shows up in our work

• TRACE, the offline S1000D and IETM viewer opens S1000D, MIL-STD-3001 and PDF technical manuals on a tablet with every marking intact.
• ELLMENT, the offline LLM for E-2D crews answers a crew's question from the aircraft's own manuals and cites the page, with no network.