Anduril Fury
The YFQ-44A Fury is America's jet-powered semi-autonomous fighter drone — a collaborative combat aircraft designed to team with crewed fighters, carry air-to-air missiles, and provide affordable mass for the US Air Force's next-generation airpower.
America's jet-powered semi-autonomous fighter drone — a collaborative combat aircraft designed to team with crewed fighters, carry air-to-air missiles, and provide affordable mass for the US Air Force's next-generation airpower.
Overview
The Anduril Fury, formally designated YFQ-44A by the US Air Force, is a jet-powered, semi-autonomous unmanned combat aerial vehicle developed under the Collaborative Combat Aircraft (CCA) Increment 1 program. Intended to fly alongside crewed fighters such as the F-22, F-35 and F-15EX, the aircraft functions as a “fighter drone” that carries air-to-air missiles, extends sensor reach, and absorbs tactical risk through affordable mass. Fury traces its airframe lineage to a high-performance aggressor concept by Blue Force Technologies, which Anduril acquired in 2023 and evolved into a clean-sheet combat system that achieved first flight just 556 days after contract award, an unusually rapid timeline for a fighter-class platform Anduril.
Development
Fury originated in the late 2010s at North Carolina startup Blue Force Technologies as “Grackle”/“REDmedium” — an aggressor drone meant to simulate adversary fighters during training. After The War Zone reported Anduril’s acquisition of the company in September 2023, the design was pitched into the USAF’s CCA program and won one of two Increment 1 contracts in April 2024 alongside General Atomics. The Air Force assigned the YFQ-44A designation — the first “unmanned fighter” in the F-for-fighter series — in March 2025, and ground testing of both Increment 1 prototypes began that spring, covering propulsion, avionics, autonomy integration and ground control DefenseScoop. The first flight, announced on 31 October 2025, took place at the Southern California Logistics Airport in Victorville with two L-29 chase planes; the Air Force noted the type went “from concept to flight in less than two years.”
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