There is no like-for-like per-aircraft production-price increase established by the available official figures for the last three years. The clearest recent comparison is broader: the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) reported that the Defense Department’s total F-35 acquisition estimate rose by $43 billion, from its December 2022 estimate to $485.2 billion in December 2023. That is growth in the estimated cost of acquiring the program—not a $43 billion increase in the price of producing individual jets.
What the $43 billion increase measures
GAO’s 2025 report says the December 2023 DoD estimate put total F-35 program acquisition costs at $485.2 billion, $43 billion above the December 2022 estimate. The figures are in then-year dollars, and GAO describes the December 2023 figure as the latest DoD estimate available when it prepared the report. It should not be treated as a live 2026 estimate. GAO’s 2025 F-35 report attributes most of the recent acquisition-estimate growth to expanded Block 4 modernization scope and increased costs for the Technology Refresh 3 (TR-3) upgrade.
Acquisition is a program-wide measure, not the price tag for one aircraft. It includes procurement and other costs associated with acquiring the program. Therefore, the $43 billion change cannot be divided by the number of jets to produce a valid per-plane price increase.
Why other F-35 cost figures do not answer the same question
Procurement estimate: a different baseline
In a 2023 report, GAO said estimated procurement costs had increased by $13.4 billion compared with the 2019 estimate. GAO linked part of that growth to spreading purchases across more years and extending the delivery schedule. This is a longer-baseline procurement comparison, not the $43 billion change between the December 2022 and December 2023 total acquisition estimates. GAO’s 2023 F-35 report
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Sustainment: the cost of operating and supporting the fleet
GAO reported that estimated lifetime F-35 sustainment costs rose from $1.1 trillion in 2018 to $1.58 trillion in 2023. Sustainment covers operating and supporting aircraft over their service lives; it is not the cost to manufacture them. GAO’s 2024 F-35 report
Delivery delays: relevant context, not a unit-price figure
Lockheed Martin delivered 110 F-35s in 2024, and GAO reported that those aircraft were an average of 238 days late. The average lateness was 61 days in 2023. GAO identified TR-3 as the primary driver of the late 2024 deliveries. Delays help explain program difficulties, but these delivery figures do not establish how much the production price per jet changed. GAO’s 2025 F-35 report
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Why a three-year per-jet comparison needs more specific data
A meaningful production-price comparison would need comparable per-aircraft figures for two exact endpoints, with the aircraft variants, contract lots, and dollar basis identified. The official comparisons above use different cost categories and time windows, so combining them would create a misleading trend.
For example, the Navy’s FY2024 budget justification provides budget quantities and appropriations context, but those figures are not a comparable production price per jet. The Navy’s FY2024 aircraft procurement justification does not by itself establish a three-year unit-price trend. Lockheed Martin’s filing says Lots 18 and 19 together cover 296 aircraft and were definitized on September 29, 2025; that contract scope and date likewise do not supply a comparable three-year per-aircraft price series. Lockheed Martin’s September 2025 filing
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The most accurate answer
The best-supported recent number is a $43 billion increase in the total F-35 acquisition estimate from December 2022 to December 2023, as reported by GAO in 2025. The evidence here does not establish a precise increase in the cost to produce each F-35 jet over the last three years. The $13.4 billion procurement-estimate increase uses a 2019 baseline, while sustainment and delivery-delay figures describe separate aspects of the program.
Quick Recap
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