A system and method for operating a dynamic vertical situation display on an aircraft includes generating display data for a dynamic vertical situation display displayed on a display based upon flight plan data from a flight management system, where the flight plan data includes a plurality of waypoints and one or more phases of flight. A current phase of flight of the aircraft and a number of waypoints currenting displayed on the dynamic vertical situation display on the display is determined, and instructions to dynamically change a size of the dynamic vertical situation display on the display are generated based upon at least one of the number of waypoints currenting displayed on the display and the current phase of flight of the aircraft.