Eli5 why do military planes fly in a formation

Question

Does it have specific tactical advantages or is it just cool?

Edit to add: what about specific types of formations, like a Flying V vs a Diamond vs whatever else they can do?

In: 797

Answer 1

Because they have several airplanes that need to go to the same place at the same time. A formation organizes them so they can fly together without crashing into each other and causing the least possible turbulence on each other’s flight path.