[1] The first flight of the ADC Cirrus-powered prototype DH.60 Moth (registration G-EBKT) was carried out by Geoffrey de Havilland at the works airfield at Stag Lane on 22 February 1925.

A useful feature of the design was its folding wings which allowed owners to hangar the aircraft in much smaller spaces.

The prototype was modified with a horn-balanced rudder, as used on the production aircraft, and was entered into the 1925 King's Cup Race flown by Alan Cobham.

de Havilland therefore decided to replace the Cirrus with a new engine designed by Frank Halford to be built by his own factory.

Next to the increase in power, the main advantage of this update was that the Gipsy was a completely new engine available in as great a number as the manufacture of Moths necessitated.

This also enabled de Havilland to control the complete process of building a Moth airframe, engine and all, streamline productivity and in the end lower manufacturing costs.

The DH.60T Tiger Moth was further modified with swept back mainplanes and the cabane struts were moved forward to improve egress from the front cockpit in case of emergency.

The fuel tank was still housed in the bulging airfoil that formed the centre section of the upper wing.

This was in spite of the fact that with de Havilland having switched from the Cirrus engine to its own Gipsy engine, surplus Cirruses were now pouring into the market and a trove of Cirrus-powered aircraft like the Avro Avian, the Klemm Swallow, and the Miles Hawk started fighting for the flying club and private market.

The 'Lonely Flyer' Sir Francis Chichester flew his Gipsy Moth from England to Australia, on to New Zealand and then across the Pacific to Japan.

Of the aviatrixes, London secretary Amy Johnson flew her Gipsy Moth (G-AAAH "Jason") 11,000 mi (17,703 km) to Australia in 1930, and Jean Batten used a Gipsy Moth for her flights from England to India and England to Australia (the aircraft used to fly to India was G-AALG borrowed from Victor Dorée, who then owned the aircraft.

In March 1928 Mary Bailey flew her Cirrus Moth solo from Croydon to Cape Town, a trip of three weeks, and returned the following year.

In particular the RAF initially purchased only a handful of aircraft for testing and found that many aspects of the Moth did not suit their method of military flight training.

Moth trainers were however ordered by a number of foreign air forces including those of Argentina, Australia (as noted above), Austria, Norway, Portugal, Sweden and the flying arm of the Danish Navy.

Like this, civilian Moths ended up flying for both the Nationalist and Republican air forces during the Spanish Civil War.

This was repeated on a larger scale during the Second World War where Moths ended up flying, amongst others, for the air forces of Egypt, China (with several captured ex-Chinese aircraft flying for the Japanese), Ireland, Italy, Iraq, Belgian Congo, Dutch East Indies (later taken over by the Indonesian AF), South Africa, New Zealand and the U.S. Navy.