Competent authority
The Federal Office of Civil Aviation (FOCA), BAZL in German and OFAC in French, is the authority for uncrewed aircraft. Skyguide manages the airspace and the clearances attached to it.
⚠️ Switzerland is not in the EU, and it applies the European regulation anyway. Since 1 January 2023 it has adopted Regulation (EU) 2019/947 through its bilateral air transport agreement. That sets it apart from the United Kingdom, which left the framework, and from the United States, which never joined it: your European A1/A3 certificate is valid here, and a Swiss one is valid in the Union.
Registration
Operator registration is done on UAS.gate, the FOCA portal, and it is free. The number received must be displayed visibly on each aircraft.
The threshold is the European one: 250 g, or any aircraft carrying a camera or a sensor able to collect personal data, whatever its mass.
Remote pilot certification
Subcategories A1, A2 and A3 of the Open category apply as they stand, with the same safety distances from uninvolved people. Training and the exam are taken online, and a certificate obtained in an EU member state is recognised.
Operating categories
Open, Specific and Certified, unchanged: it is the same European text. The ordinary ceiling remains 120 m above ground, within visual line of sight.
Airspace and official resources
FOCA publishes the restriction map, and Skyguide holds the air traffic control part of it. Aerodrome surroundings, nature reserves and military installations are the most frequent cases.
National specifics
The terrain changes how a map reads. A 120 m ceiling is measured above the ground, and Swiss ground rises fast: a steep slope can push a flight out of the ceiling without the pilot changing barometric altitude. That is the difficulty specific to this country, and no zone map shows it.
Geneva concentrates particular restrictions around international organisation sites, and alpine military installations add perimeters that cannot be guessed from the valley.