Handy guide how to tell apart the most common fighters of the Su-27 family, that are currently operated by the Russian Air Force.

At the moment, the only early Su-27 variant you still can find is Su-27P (Су-27П) interceptor.

Su-27SM is the first modernization of Su-27, which got better ground attack capabilities.

And Su-27SM3 is the latest and most perfected variant of Su-27, slightly unified with Su-35S. It inherited all features of the Su-27SM and got some of the new ones.

And here are the features that are inherent to all single-seater Su-27s without exception:

Su-35S is also a single-seater, but it has significant differences from the Su-27:

Now to two-seater aircrafts. They came from the Su-27UB (Су-27УБ) trainer:

Su-30 is a multirole fighter based on the Su-27UB. There are a lot of variants of Su-30 but they all have some significant differences from their predecessor:

The majority of Su-30 variants in Russia are Su-30M2 (manufactured in Komsomolsk-on-Amur) and Su-30SM (manufactured in Irkutsk). They have significant difference in tasks and aerodynamics.

I haven't mentioned Su-33 because it can be easily identified by it's canards, markings and arresting hook. As well as Su-34, which have very distinctive "duck beak" and "shoulder-to-shoulder" cockpit.

Original post by derNachtigall: https://pikabu.ru/story/_5133292