List of Royal Air Force ground trades
This is a list of Royal Air Force ground trades. All Royal Air Force enlisted airmen of each ground trade in the RAF are currently assigned into a numbered Trade Group, under which it operates for administrative command and control.
Originally, ground trades in the RAF were organised by specialisms into groups numbering I, II, III, IV, and V, along with M for any medical associated trades. They were subsequently changed into numerical Trade Groups, one of the earliest mentions was the creation of Trade Group 9 for the trade of Firefighter on 31 December 1943 as part of the newly created RAF Fire Service. By 1951, the Royal Air Force had established twenty-two official Trade Groups, as shown below. The total number of Trade Groups have since undergone amalgamation into nineteen groups in 1964, and down to eighteen TGs by the early 2000s. With further subsequent amalgamations, only seventeen of the original Trade Groups existed until 2022, when branch and trade was discontinued as an identifier, with personnel being allocated to professions instead.
It is important to distinguish that all enlisted personnel in the RAF were assigned to a Trade Group; whereas commissioned officers in the RAF belonged to an RAF Branch.