Just got a new ship with hanger bay. My question is, how do you know how many fighters exist at a certain moment in battle, or were left after battle. They are so tiny and hard to look around and count.

currently.. you cant,

Its pretty much a guessing game with small ships, but given small ships tend to have a small cooldown, you can launch whenever you think you should,

There have been suggestions about improving the interface for carriers/flight decks to incorperate counters, but nothing heard so far :p

there is a way in the UI settings that can show your current fighters and their name and/or health at all times to see how many you have left. thats the only way i know of to see how many you have left.

Learn to count really fast, and don't blink...

I think that's the only way.

or just spam the launch button as soon as it becomes available.

There's a button? o_O
Gotta check.

P.S. "Don't blink!" is also great advice concerning statues.

There's a way to give fighters unit and health frames (they're turned off by default). There is not a "status window" showing a quick summary of your squadron.

But the options to change the HUD indicators for your/allied/enemy fighters doesn't help when your fighters are "behind" the camera or off escorting fred while you're shooting at joe.

Or when they cluster up, I've had 1 "name" represent 3-5 fighters at times in a mission. That, and spamming the fighter button at random times can screw up a fighter op...