July 8, 2026, 11:04 am | Read time: 3 minutes
It happens more often than you think: Tiny spiders suddenly take to the air and drift away—almost invisible on gossamer threads. For many, this sounds like a horror scenario: eight-legged creatures that simply lift off and travel miles through the air—without wings like bees or flies. In fact, some of the approximately 46,000 spider species have mastered this trick. PETBOOK explains how these “flying” spiders do it.
Can Some Spiders Fly?
In the fall, something happens that many don’t even notice: Small spiders suddenly take to the air and drift away. They sail with the wind—silently and almost invisibly. The reason for this is surprisingly brutal: Many young spiders become cannibalistic at a certain stage of development and eat each other. To survive, they often have no choice but to flee, and that leads them into the air.1
In Germany, it is mainly small species like sheet weavers or crab spiders that exhibit this behavior. Instead of real wings, they use a trick: They let the wind carry them, covering sometimes astonishing distances.
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How Can Spiders Fly?
Spiders have eight legs but no wings. So how can they fly? This question is being explored by scientists at TU Berlin, among others. They have observed various spiders climbing to the highest point in their surroundings, such as a blade of grass, a flower, or a branch. Then the spiders raise a leg—probably to test the air currents.2
If the launch conditions are favorable, the spiders shoot fine threads from their spinnerets at the rear of their bodies into the air. These threads are much thinner than those they use to weave their webs. The wind stretches and fans out the threads, creating a kind of parachute. The spiders can then sail through the air on this.
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How Far Can Spiders Fly Through the Air?
Some spiders can travel hundreds of kilometers and up to four kilometers high through the air. What is particularly astonishing is that they can do all this without wings and even in complete calm.3
This is made possible by an unusual trick: Researchers have discovered that spiders not only use the wind but also the Earth’s electric field. Their gossamer threads become electrostatically charged and repel each other, creating a kind of invisible “parachute” that carries them into the air.
In Germany, however, most of these flights are much shorter and often only cover a few meters. That’s enough for the spiders to escape—for example, from other spiders, which are often cannibalistic. The findings from this research are not only fascinating but also useful: They could help develop flight technologies for drones or airplanes in the future.