From supersonic jets capable of halving intercontinental travel times to radical blended-wing aircraft promising dramatic carbon reductions, a new generation of aerospace visionaries is rewriting the rules of flight. Olivia Palamountain reports

Aviation has perfected incremental improvement. Each new airliner flies slightly further, burns marginally less fuel, makes fractionally less noise. For decades, this slow and steady evolution has defined an industry built on safety and reliability.

Meanwhile, in hangars worldwide, engineers are dreaming up aircraft that ignore these constraints entirely. From sleek supersonic jets and blended-wing giants to spaceplanes, the emerging era of "Proto Planes" - prototype aircraft pushing the boundaries of what's possible - promises to reshape how we think about flight, speed and the very geometry of aircraft themselves.

If these are blueprints for an entirely new era of flight, then the most symbolic development in this new age is the supersonic revival. In January 2025, Boom Supersonic's XB-1 demonstrator broke the sound barrier above California's Mojave Desert, achieving Mach 1.1 and marking the first time an independently developed jet has exceeded the speed of sound. As reported by The Telegraph: "It's time to go big and take this airplane and scale it up," declares Blake Scholl, Boom's founder. "We're not going to stop until everyone can benefit from this."

The company's commercial Overture airliner, planned for the decade's end, promises to cruise at Mach 1.7 - potentially halving the Paris-New York journey to four hours. With United and American Airlines having placed outline orders, the £200 million aircraft represents a tangible step toward making supersonic travel accessible again. But America isn't alone in this race. China's state-owned Comac has teased the development of the C949, a supersonic aircraft promising an 11,000km range. (See case study below.)

"Concorde gave us just a glimpse of what it feels like to collapse the map of the world. It wasn't only about speed - it was about seduction - the idea that the future had suddenly arrived at the party from across the pond, two hours early," Edmond Huot, chief creative officer, Forward Group, who specialises in design within the airline industry, tells Globetrender. "What people crave most today is..."

To read the full trend, including an interview with Aleksey Matyushev, co-founder and CEO of Natilus, a deep dive into the supersonic Chinese model set to outpace Concorde, and key data points, subscribe to VOLT. Annual subscribers receive twice monthly trend reports, a library of 200+ reports, plus two 60-minute ideation calls per year with Globetrender's in-house trend strategist.