APRS Mobile vs AirPing

APRS Mobile connects your iPhone and iPad straight to APRS-IS, the internet side of the Automatic Packet Reporting System used by amateur radio operators worldwide. Watch the stations around you live, look up any station, message other hams and beacon your position. No account needed. Work over your own radio too — with a Bluetooth or network TNC, or with nothing but an audio cable and the built-in software modem. LIVE MAP • Stations appear the moment they're heard, with their APRS symbols and callsigns • Tracks, PHG circles and a Layers panel: fixed, mobile and weather stations, digipeaters, IGates and objects • Via: one control for every link — APRS-IS, TNC and software modem STATION DETAILS • Tap a station for a quick card, then its full page, updated live • Last heard, beacon prediction, digipath, comment and status • Position, Maidenhead grid, speed, course, altitude and distance from you • Current weather, plus weather and telemetry charts APRS MESSAGING • Chat with any station, with conversations and message bubbles • Messages go out over APRS-IS or straight over your radio; IGates carry them between the two • Automatic retries until acknowledged, with receipts • Notifications for messages to your callsign, even with the app closed • Block or report a station; offensive language is hidden behind a tap RADIO — TNC (OPTIONAL) • Connect a Mobilinkd TNC4, or a TNC3 on Bluetooth LE firmware, to send and receive over your own radio • Or reach a KISS TNC on your network: Direwolf on a Raspberry Pi, or a TNC on a serial-to-WiFi bridge • Choose how messages and beacons go out, and where map stations come from: radio, APRS-IS or both • Stays connected in the background, so beaconing and receiving carry on • Run a fill-in digipeater or an IGate from your phone • A TNC and a radio are separate purchases; everything else works without them RADIO — SOFTWARE MODEM (OPTIONAL) • No TNC required: with an audio cable your phone is the modem — 1200 baud APRS decoded from your radio's audio • Transmit through a radio set to VOX, with adjustable TX delay and level • A live spectrum with both tones marked, a level check in plain language and a clipping warning • Receiving needs no licence; transmitting is off until you confirm you hold one OFFLINE MAPS • Download OpenStreetMap-based maps for the areas you care about, and the map works with no network BEACONING • Four ways to beacon, from Settings or the map: off, SmartBeaconing, every so often, or fixed • SmartBeaconing beacons more often when moving fast or turning, less when slow or stopped • Fixed position suits a home station: type it in once, and no GPS is used • Carries on in the background when you allow it, with a low-power mode • Choose your APRS symbol, comment and position ambiguity AND MORE • Search for any callsign, city or zip code • An Apple Watch app: beacon, messages, nearby stations and weather graphs • Imperial, metric and nautical units, any APRS-IS server Receiving is free: anyone can watch APRS activity and weather stations. Transmitting — beacons, messages, the digipeater — needs APRS Mobile Transmit, a yearly auto-renewing subscription with the first month free. If you had APRS Mobile before version 1.4, transmitting stays free for you. It also requires an amateur radio license; over APRS-IS it needs the passcode for your callsign, and over the air it has to be switched on by hand. Terms: https://aprsmobile.app/terms Privacy: https://aprsmobile.app/privacy The software modem uses the microphone to hear your radio. The audio is decoded on your device, never recorded and never sent. Weather and telemetry history charts, and offline map downloads, come from openaprs.ai; everything else comes straight from APRS-IS or your radio. Offline map data © OpenStreetMap contributors. Positions you send can be seen on other APRS websites too. Continued use of GPS running in the background can dramatically decrease battery life. A live APRS-IS feed uses a lot of data.

AirPing is the flight tracking app powered by your own data. If you run an ADS-B receiver, it lets you view the planes you track right from your iPhone. Using this app requires you to run your own ADS-B receiver with a tar1090 or readsb instance. You can find information about how to set up your instance for use with the app on our website, https://airping.app.