Bayraktar TB2
Country: 
TurkeyManufacturer: Baykar
Turkish armed MALE drone that became a global symbol of modern UAV warfare: a key player in Syria, Libya, Nagorno-Karabakh and Ukraine, it redefined the battlefield balance with unprecedented cost-effectiveness.
Turkish armed MALE drone that became a global symbol of modern UAV warfare: a key player in Syria, Libya, Nagorno-Karabakh and Ukraine, it redefined the battlefield balance with unprecedented cost-effectiveness.
Community
Data trust
- Reliability
- Unverified
- Sources
- Sources pending review
Identity
- Designation
- Bayraktar TB2
- Alias
- TB2
- Manufacturer
- Baykar
- Country
- Turkey
- Year
- 2014
- Category
- UCAV (Combat UAV)
- Class
- MALE (Medium-altitude / long-endurance)
- Status
- In service
Performance
- Range
- 300 km
- Endurance
- 27 h
- Top speed
- 220 km/h
- Service ceiling
- 7,600 m
- Propulsion
- Pistone Rotax 912iS (poi PD-170 turbo nazionale), 100 hp, elica spintore
Physical characteristics
- MTOW
- 700 kg
- Payload
- 150 kg
- Hardpoints
- 4
- Weapons
- MAM-L, MAM-C, MAM-T, Bozok (Roketsan)
- Unit cost
- 5 M USD
Onboard systems
- Sensors
- WESCAM CMX-15D EO/IR/laser
- Datalink / control
- Datalink LOS 300 km, opzione SATCOM
- Launch
- Pista
- Recovery
- Pista
Production & inventory
- Annual production
- ≈ 200/anno (2023)
- Estimated inventory
- Oltre 500 esemplari consegnati in 30+ paesi
Combat use
- ▸Operation Spring Shield, Syria (2020)
- ▸Libyan civil war — support to the GNA (2019-2020)
- ▸Nagorno-Karabakh War (2020)
- ▸Russian-Ukrainian War (2022-present)
- ▸Operation Spring Shield, Syria (2020) — destruction of Syrian mechanised columns
- ▸Libyan civil war — support to the GNA against Haftar (2019-2020)
- ▸2020 Nagorno-Karabakh War — destruction of 200+ Armenian armoured vehicles
- ▸Russian-Ukrainian War (2022-present) — documented hits on Pantsir, Tor, Black Sea Fleet vessels
- ▸Ethiopian counter-terrorism operations in Tigray (2021-2022)
Tags
Main operators
History
First flight in 2014 and operational service the same year with the Turkish armed forces. The TB2 is the first MALE armed drone mass-produced outside the US, Israel and China.
Its use by Azerbaijani forces during the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh war against Armenian troops showed the world the drone's devastating effectiveness against T-72 tanks, 2K12 Kub SAM systems and artillery batteries, generating the media phenomenon known as the 'Bayraktar effect'.
The Bayraktar TB2 is the most successful and media-celebrated Turkish military drone in history: it transformed Baykar from a small family firm into a defence giant with over USD 3 billion in exports between 2018 and 2023, and propelled Turkey to become the world's third UCAV exporter after the US and China.
Its effectiveness in the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh war revolutionised NATO doctrines on low-cost deep strike, proving that a USD 5 million MALE drone can neutralise a deployed armoured division in hours — fuelling the 'Bayraktar effect' media phenomenon and even inspiring a popular Ukrainian war anthem.
Between 2022 and 2024 the TB2 became the political-military symbol of Ukrainian resistance to the Russian invasion, with viral videos of direct hits on Pantsir-S1 systems, Tor SAM batteries and BTR-82A vehicles documented by the official Ukrainian Army channel.