Commercial UAV Expo 2026, the leading conference and trade show for the commercial drone industry, returns to Caesars Forum in Las Vegas, September 1-3. The event, a sister show to Geo Week, will once again feature three days of conference sessions in breakout rooms, while the exhibit hall will feature over 200 of the leading companies from across the industry, two content stages, and an indoor flying demonstration area, among other features.
The program covers the full breadth of the commercial UAV industry, from drone delivery to public safety to counter-UAS. But as always, there’s plenty on the agenda built specifically for the surveying and mapping crowd. The geospatial industry has been among the earliest and most consistent adopters of drone technology, and this year’s program reflects just how far that adoption has matured. If you’re using drones in your surveying, mapping, or AEC workflows today, or you’re weighing whether to bring the technology in-house, there’s a lot here worth your time.
BVLOS Take Center Stage
Last year at this time, the industry was digesting the newly released BVLOS Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM). This year, that rulemaking is much closer to becoming operational reality, and whether or not the final rule is released prior to the event, Part 108 is going to be a major part of all conversations.
That, of course, includes conversations among those in the geospatial industry. What Drone Surveying Looks Like When All the Pieces Come Together includes a presentation from Juan Plaza of Plaza Aerospace Corp that walks through the shift in liability from individual pilot to corporation and what that means for Safety Management Systems, insurance, and legal exposure once mapping companies start flying beyond visual line of sight under the new rule. The same session also covers the expanding role of bathymetric data collection and why ASPRS accuracy standards matter more as the profession matures.
For a broader look at what widespread BVLOS adoption means operationally, What Widespread BVLOS Will Practically Mean for Operators brings together voices from regulatory affairs, software, and international markets to dig into how staffing, equipment, and data infrastructure need to evolve as waivers give way to standardized operations. And Flying BVLOS in the New Regulatory Era: Making UTM Work in the Real World rounds things out with a practical look at integrating with UTM systems, informed by operators already coordinating shared airspace in dense environments.
In addition to these specific sessions, there will be representatives from regulatory bodies across the world – including the FAA – both on the exhibit hall floor and elsewhere on the program. They will be able to provide concrete updates on all regulatory issues, both relating to BVLOS and not, and answer specific questions you might have about how your workflows will and will not change as regulations and expectations begin to shift.
Sessions For The Geospatial Industry
Of course, the regulatory picture is only part of the discussion for drone operators. In addition to that content, this year’s Commercial UAV Expo program features technical presentations and case studies from people within the geospatial and AEC industries. Best Practices for Maintaining Survey-Grade Accuracy in High-Volume UAV Operations brings in experts from Trimble Applanix, YellowScan, MJ Engineering, and RMD Systems to address a question that gets harder as programs scale: How do you maintain reliable, survey-grade accuracy across massive, multi-flight datasets without sacrificing productivity? This session will provide a deep look at hardware selection, mission planning, and lidar, photogrammetry, and trajectory processing workflows.
Merging UAV and Ground-Based Data: Real-World Challenges and Lessons From the Field tackles one of the biggest challenges anyone in the geospatial industry is facing today: how to seamlessly merge data from different sources like UAS, mobile mapping, terrestrial lidar, and ground-penetrating radar for a cohesive deliverable. The session features insights from two presenters who have dealt with this in real-world scenarios with the Army Corps of Engineers and Langan Engineering, who can share both their success stories and where the biggest bottlenecks occur.
It’s not just pure surveying that will be discussed on the program, either, as there are sessions covering case studies from the construction and infrastructure sectors as well. How Leading AEC Firms Are Putting Drone Data to Work covers lidar-driven crane planning, AI-powered change detection using Gaussian Splats, and a case study on how AECOM built its internal UAS program from the ground up. And Scaling Drones Across the DOT: Operational Lessons from the Field looks at how state transportation departments are moving from ad-hoc drone use to enterprise-grade programs, with MassDOT’s Aeronautics Division sharing a transferable framework for scaling public-sector UAS operations.
Meeting Industry Leaders And Peers
The conference program is only part of the value here. The exhibit hall floor brings together many of the leading names in surveying and mapping technology, with networking events at the end of every day to keep the conversation alive. There are also roundtable sessions throughout the event that are available to all attendees and provide space for professionals across verticals to discuss challenges and successes. Between the programming and the floor, there’s no shortage of ways to walk away with a clearer picture of where drone-based surveying is today, and where it might be headed.
Don’t miss your chance to learn about the latest trends in UAV-based surveying and see the technology firsthand. Register today for Commercial UAV Expo 2026.
Don’t miss your chance to learn about the latest trends in UAV-based surveying and see the technology firsthand.
Register today for Commercial UAV Expo 2026.
