Radars to track Aircraft we can use updated 27Nov2023
mars...@gmail.com
Radars We Can use on Computers & Smartphones to track Aircraft
Updated on 27Nov2023,
My First choice for seeing Civilian Aircraft on a Radar Website is Flightradar24.com aka FR24 https://www.flightradar24.com/51.85,1.16/8 i have used this for many years ( roughly since about 2014/2015) but that does not show most Military aircraft so i often open up a few more browser tabs & use https://www.adsbexchange.com/ to see Military planes click tracking map then map to see the planes https://globe.adsbexchange.com/ for how to use that excellent website see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=11E4O7BwQdw&ab_channel=AviationVideos%26WildlifeFULLHD
for how to playback the info to see something/ a plane that happened in the past see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZpRjP8Q5DJg&ab_channel=AviationVideos%26WildlifeFULLHD
I made a comparison video “ Military & Civil Radars Comparison FR24 360Radar ADSBEXCHANGE & Freedar 24jan2021 “ watch that herehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FibCT2graJI&ab_channel=AviationVideos%26WildlifeFULLHD
There are lots of other sites I sometimes use , to see what’s different / work out something that's not easy to id on whatever site i am looking at.
Bookmark these sites in your browser eg Google Chrome browser is my first choice of browser : get that here https://www.google.com/chrome/ its free or simple bookmark the webpage you find this article on .
Other Radar services to try listed in alphabetical order :
( I put # then a couple of letters so I can quickly jump up or down the document I made this article in )
# 360 letter area
https://360radar.co.uk/ https://subscribers.360radar.co.uk/VirtualRadar/ shows Military Aircraft and costs £ to use it , i was involved in beta testing this site so i got to use it for free but once they started charging i stopped using it as i have other sites i can see military on for free.I think I will rejoin it in 2021 . But this does seem to be the best for Military in that it detects more aircraft & from further away ( i saw it on a friends phone while i was at Marham awaiting a new batch of F-35's coming from USA & 360 detected their tankers long before the other 2 sites ive mentioned in this article showed them. But things change just because 1 sites better in 2019 doesnt mean the others cant catch up & improve on what their rivals can do. i am very glad for the competing sites as competition improves things .
Lot of complaints online about 360 site having issues in June 2019 Thats not out of date info I mention that to show all sites suffer issues sometimes . It cost £21.99 a year to use in 2021 or 3 months for £6.99 paid using Paypal ( it’s a Website not a phone app they say they wont ever do an app ) or is free if you submit data to their site eg by using something like a Raspberry PI go to https://signup.360radar.co.uk/ to join they offer 24 hour free trial which is not long to judge a service. See https://signup.360radar.co.uk/faq/ Their list of frequently Asked Questions
they say they have excellent coverage of the UK & we cover much of western Europe thanks to a tie up with a European bases aircraft tracking system.: We rely upon a network of over 1,200 fantastic contributors who receive data from aircraft around them and then upload this to our server.See a map with where their receivers are https://radar.lowflyingwales.co.uk/receivers/ On 24 jan 2021 I did their free 24 hour trial and found they lack any coverage of America / Canada / south America in fact pretty much everywhere but Britain and western Europe.
I made a comparison video “ Military & Civil Radars Comparison FR24 360Radar ADSBEXCHANGE & Freedar 24jan2021 “ watch that herehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FibCT2graJI&ab_channel=AviationVideos%26WildlifeFULLHD
# ad letter area
https://www.adsbexchange.com/ goes to https://globe.adsbexchange.com/ this is the best site to see Military aviation on in my opionion
on 24 October 2020 they now show a height indicator at the bottom of the screen to explain the coloured icons of planes . It used to go to https://tar1090.adsbexchange.com/ ( sometime around March 2020 they did a massive change to their website, the icons are all different colours, the site was at first is hard to use on a mobile phone screen as they clearly had not coded it correctly to fit mobile screens but they fixed that in late 2020 . Now you have lots of buttons down the right hand side to mess about with , info you can choose to see on the radar. Press U at the top to only see Military planes. I will make a video to explain the new site soon as there are so many changes. It used to go to https://global.adsbexchange.com/VirtualRadar/desktop.html if you click the right area of the website , it has a military filter so you can get rid of all the civilian clutter on the map and only see some of the Military aircraft that are in the air now press the U button, ( it wont show everything eg if 8x F-15's depart Lakenheath only 1 may show up ) i made a shortcut to this on an android phone via chrome browser .
As of 24 feb 2020 i see that from the Global radar View tab there is now the option to use https://tar1090.adsbexchange.com/ the tab to access that says its a BETA service that means its still being tested. At First glance i see lots of civilian planes in Blue / Green , Orange etc dont know what the colors represent yet .( height of the planes is the reason for the colour changes) There are buttons vertically on the right hand side eg I is for isolate so if you click 1 plane icon then click I it isolates that plane so that all others are removed from the map , Itll take some getting used to this service. Press L for labels to appear on each plane icon . Icons for planes are bad sometimes eg icon for a Hercules looks the shape of a 747 ! , clearly they have a lot to fix on this new look site. # Fixed b4 15dec2020 layout on mobile screen now much better . In January 2023 this site was sold see https://www.wired.com/story/ads-b-exchange-jetnet-sale/#:~:text=ADS%2DB%20Exchange%2C%20beloved%20for,its%20biggest%20fans%20are%20bailing.&text=A%20major%20independent%20flight%20tracking,of%20a%20private%20equity%20firm. This caused some people to stop feeding data to it and they started rival websites ( see my list of other radars lower down in this article ) There is a Reddit group for this service to ask questions about it here https://www.reddit.com/r/ADSBexchange/
# ap letter area
https://apps.apple.com/us/app/trackair/id1451161394 i first heard of on 10 July 2020 via some1 commenting on one of my videos, its augmented reality for Apple phones so no use to me , dont know if they have an Android version, .
# do letter area
http://donnyradar.co.uk/live/map is for the skies over Yorkshire and lincolnshire i added that on 12 September 2020 it was mentioned on this fb group RAF Coningsby Spotters Group
# ea letter area
https://ea-radar.co.uk/desktop.html# i found on 27aug19 thanks to Scott D on a Fairford fb page, at first glance i dont see how to get the plane icons to display the operator or reg of each plane. Maybe there is a way ? they are on Facebook so use that for support requests https://www.facebook.com/earadaruk/?hc_location=ufi it was an error which they fixed very quickly on 27th August 2019 ( like within 5mins of it being reported) now by 6pm 27aug19 it does show the planes registrations , callsign and height on each plane icon on the map phew ! , by 4december 2019 this site isnt loading at all in chrome browser the website seems to be down, its still down on 5th Dec2019. https://www.facebook.com/earadaruk/ use that to report problems to them. as of 16dec2019 its still offline : This site can’t be reached The webpage at https://ea-radar.co.uk/desktop.html# might be temporarily down or it may have moved permanently to a new web address. ERR_NAME_RESOLUTION_FAILED
# fl letter area
https://www.flightradar24.com/52.17,0.12/11 probably the best known and most used Civilian aircraft tracking website and app, sometime in late 2020 or so I see it does now show some Military aircraft even over Iraq ! it has a playback feature so you can work out a plane you saw up to a week after you saw something. It is still free to use and the free version has enough for me they make money from adverts , or you can pay to use their service if you need more detail see https://www.flightradar24.com/premium?utm_source=website&utm_medium=nav&utm_campaign=menu_subs prices from £9.99 per year . It also has a good forum so you can learn how to feed info into their system to track planes https://forum.flightradar24.com/ Flightradar24 started as a hobby project in 2006 when two Swedish aviation geeks decided to build a network of ADS-B receivers in Northern and Central Europe.
- Largest ADS-B network in the world with over 20,000 connected receivers
- Over 180,000 flights tracked per day. See our Statistics page for daily stats
- 2+ million users per day
- #1 app on AppStore in 130+ countries
- #1 travel app on AppStore in 150+ countries
- 40+ million app downloads , by late 2020 they now seem to show some Military stuff which is good but still no where near as much as ADSBEXCHANGE , for how the tracking works see https://www.flightradar24.com/how-it-works?fbclid=IwAR2oYQhqWqE5sTMXVZCIfm9t4Jo3z-xaLCbEYLglG3NFGkANEQrKEjY6LMs as they say “ When an aircraft is flying out of coverage Flightradar24 keeps estimating the position of the aircraft for up to 2 hours if the destination of the flight is known. For aircraft without known destination, position is estimated for up to 10 minutes. The position is calculated based on many different parameters and in most cases it's quite accurate, but for long flights the position can in worst cases be up to about 100 km (55 miles) off. In settings there is an option to set for how long time you want to see estimated aircraft on map.”
https://www.flight-radar.eu/ seems to be Airnav Radarbox again . I found that on 24sep2018
# fr letter area
http://freedar.uk/ becomes http://radar.freedar.uk/VirtualRadar/desktop.html once you login it can sometimes be useful. ( don’t think you have to log in anymore by 2021 ) It’s a free Website based service that can show Military aircraft & if you want to use it on your phone get the free App from https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=freedar.uk.limited&hl=en_US
you used to need a Facebook account to join this site go I am not sure as of late 2020 you still need to join their Facebook group but here it is as you will need support as they have more errors than any other radar service I use https://www.facebook.com/groups/987153834767096/
it shows a decent amount of Military ( less than Adsbexchange.com most days in late 2019 and 2020 and less than 360 Radar) and it shows lots of civilian planes . If you need support to report a problem use https://store.freedar.uk/submitticket.php they are on Twitter https://twitter.com/@freedar_uk since September 2018 , i think i heard about this site somewhere on Facebook, they do Military aircraft as green icons , civilian is white..this is a great idea as you can easily spot where Military aircraft are . If you use their world feed from the menu you can see where Military Aircraft are eg in USA. I am so glad adsbexchange has a rival as that site has been known to crash or go offline for hours if not days at a time so having a rival in Freedar means aviation fans can jump ship and carry on. I often use both sites at the same time in the past to compare information & often find Freedar has labelled the planes with more info than adsbexchange eg the Squadron & Callsigns. There is clearly a lot of effort going into Freedar so give it a try, just be aware they do have technical problem after technical problem so the site is not working 24hrs a day 7 days a week . A list of some of the Freedar problems I have noted is at the bottom of this article . On 14 November 2020 they ( Freedar) announce a new site that’s only for showing Military https://military.freedar.uk/virtualradar/mobile.html they say its on both Android and Apple app stores and also on the web & that its free, no idea why they needed to make a separate site. This shows less than adsbexchange and also suffers a lot of downtime. On 23 jan 2021 it says Bad Request (Invalid host) so the site is offline . I also had a serious problem using Freedar in the past that caused high CPU temperature see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a900RHxUV00&ab_channel=AviationVideos%26WildlifeFULLHD 31 March 2021 Ben Fry has stepped down from running Freedar
Also beware of fake freedar apps see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZZ-DbvGtNPg&ab_channel=AviationVideos%26WildlifeFULLHD
FreeRadar UK https://www.facebook.com/groups/FreeRadar/ has 454 Facebook members by 8 April 2020 they say .. . The group and radar originally started off as South Linc's only but we have grown so fast in such a short time that we have decided to remove the boundaries of just our county and will accept anyone to the group and radar system. Their websites are http://www.freeradar.uk http://radar.freeradar.uk they do not have an App as i found out by getting confused by their name which is piggy backing off Freedar ( turns out Freeradar used to feed data to Freedar but some people split off to launch a rival service...their name is too similar so rather naughty to do that ) FreeRadar is nothing to do with Freedar !
# gl letter area
https://globe.adsb.fi/ via https://adsb.fi/ has 1600 feeders worldwide, this began in approx. Jan 2023 after adsbexchange was sold and some of the people feeding data to it got very pissed off see https://www.wired.com/story/ads-b-exchange-jetnet-sale/#:~:text=ADS%2DB%20Exchange%2C%20beloved%20for,its%20biggest%20fans%20are%20bailing.&text=A%20major%20independent%20flight%20tracking,of%20a%20private%20equity%20firm. This looks just like adsbexchange but again must have a lot less feeders than adsbexchange , it is worth trying
https://globe.airplanes.live/ I add to this list on 27 November 2023 it looks very much like adsbexchange but I notice it has less coverage ( eg a business jet that shows on the ground at Cambridge Airport on adsbexchange did not show on this on 27nov23 ) but give it a try
# li letter area
https://www.live-military-mode-s.eu/ i found on 29 August 2020 via https://www.military-airshows.co.uk/bases/raf-fairford.htm at first glance it seems to show a track of where planes have been but isnt displaying everything thats live on a map ...need a guide on how to use this .
https://www.live-military-mode-s.eu/ShowMilModeSCodes.php?WhichCountry=UK i found on 29 August 2020 via https://www.military-airshows.co.uk/bases/raf-fairford.htm at first glance it seems to show a track of where planes have been but isnt displaying everything thats live on a map ...need a guide on how to use this .
https://www.live-military-mode-s.eu/history.php?DGCountry=UK i found on 29 August 2020 via https://www.military-airshows.co.uk/bases/raf-fairford.htm at first glance it seems to show a track of where planes have been in the past but isnt displaying everything thats live on a map ...need a guide on how to use this .
# pl letter area
https://planefinder.net/ is a very useful civilian aircraft tracker, has a very good playback feature so click the button near top right and it lets you see up to 2 weeks into the past this makes it more useful that fr24. this site is better at displaying bizjet info than fr24. Sometime by about June 2020 this now has begun to show some Military planes so thats great. By 2021 I see they have locked lots of info you used to see for free making the site less useful , it is $9.99 a year to go premium
http://planeradar.ru/virtualradar/desktop.html# change it to English from the menu and you can use it ok, i found that and added it on 28 April 2019 via Twitter , you can see some Military on this when it works.
# ra letter area
# radar letter area
https://www.radarbox24.com its very similar to fr24 and planefinder https://www.radarbox24.com/ doesnt have a playback feature which is a real shame so i dont use this much, there is a way to make all the planes leave trails showing their direction of travel which is a good idea .
http://radar.liveradar.uk:8080/VirtualRadar/desktop.html is from https://www.facebook.com/groups/LiveRadar/about/ Site dedicated to Flight awareness in and around the UK. If you have any images you would like to share please feel free add them. i added this on 6 November 2020 its working and shows military planes as green icons , The group and radar originally started off as South Linc's only but we have grown so fast in such a short time that we have decided to remove the boundaries of just our county and will accept anyone to the group and radar system. If you currently feed adsb or mlat to another system and would like to contribute to FreeRadar then please pop a post on here or contact an administrator. we are still accepting new feeders. Also follow LiveRadarUK website and virtual radar at:-http://www.liveradar.uk (Not currently Online) http://radar.liveradar.uk
http://www.radarvirtuel.com/ i first found on 22oct2019 but i cant get it to work in any browser, even after i turned off adblock it says please disable ad blockers. Not sure if this site is under construction or is dead .
# sk letter area
https://skyscanworld.com/homepage/ I found on 28 November 2020 via fc forum , the website needs work as at first glance some links on it don’t work , it seems to be an App that gets its data from a unique PI feed software I assume that stands for Raspberry PI the mini computer things. They say they do UK coverage including Military & World coverage. They use ADS-C satellite feeds to track transatlantic flight. I haven’t used it yet . When I click the free radar link we get oops this page could not be found 404 error ! , I have never used this service if they want me to try it they would need to give me a free trial of at least a month without needing any Card details etc https://skyscanworld.com/subscription-plan/ says it costs £27.50 a year with a 21day trial, £15.75 for 6 months with 21 day trail or 38 every 2 months with a 21 day trial I have no idea how many people feed into their system. 27nov23 it says Username and password required for access .
# uk letter area
https://uk.flightaware.com/ is I site I found when tracking the new Fat Albert as it left in its new livery from Cambridge Airport to go to Texas, the map isn’t very good , but take a look and see for yourself.
# vi letter area
http://viewthe.prestwichradar.co.uk/virtualradar/ i found on 23feb2020 via Manchester Airport Plane Spotting Group Using Flight Radar 24 https://www.facebook.com/groups/339442026187899/ at first look it seems to be just focused on the manchester area , you will need to set up an account to access it and the person running it is saying he may shut it down soon over costs etc .
If you know of any other free Websites or Apps for tracking planes let me know asap As Soon as possible please. I would also like to know of any paid Websites or Apps. Anyway that’s a lot of services I have listed for you I hope you enjoy using them,
These are my videos of aircraft https://www.youtube.com/c/AwesomeFullHDvideos/videos if you click playlists then it will show created playlists and if you hunt around you will find airshows I filmed and locations I have travelled to to film planes so take a good look and watch as many videos of mine as you want thanks go here for my playlists https://www.youtube.com/c/AwesomeFullHDvideos/playlists
Dave
# end of main article
Info last updated on 11nov2020 , 16nov2020, 15dec2020, 23jan2021 , 27nov23,
Due to Corona Virus fr24 only tracking 6893 planes by 24 March 2020 , just 5001 planes tracked by them on 8 April 2020 549pm ! , jesus h christ .
# List of some problems using ADSBExchange
today for 1st time ever there is a black dot on the map right where i live ! hours later the dot has moved a couple of miles from me but it was right on my house..why ? how are they tracking us ? sometimes i take a screenshot to show someone something online i dont want my exact location given away I am in chrome browser on a windows pc
# list of some problems I have had using Freedar & info about it : sorry but there are too many errors to list them all but here’s some I made a not of ..
8 July 2020 a new Big problem with Freedar i just reported to them : just noticed freedar in chrome browser caused big temperature spikes on my new laptop that has an intel i7 core , are you aware of this ? why would it be using so much of the cpu ? temps going up to 90degrees, when i close the tab that had freedar my temps drop to 43degrees within a minute or so i use free software called RealTemp 3.70 to see my temps, they replied Hi dave have passed this on and also done a little research this is a problem with the latest google chrome update not with freedar my suggestion would be to try it on another browser. I replied thing is ive been using freedar on chrome for many months without this problem, so something changed very recently ( 8 july 2020) as freedar say some new chrome update they say is the cause , Version 83.0.4103.116 (Official Build) (64-bit) is what i now have of chrome browser on 9 july 2020, last time i had a browser tab doing anything like this i turned out some scumbag website had hidden a bitcoin mining thing on their webpage that used your CPU without permission, , i fitted coin hive blocker a browser plugin to stop websites doing that again . If Freedar say this is nothing to do with them is there anything they can do to prevent chrome overheating our computers ? for now i will have to use a different browser when i use freedar on a pc, https://chromereleases.googleblog.com/.../stable-channel... says the chrome version i have was first released 22june ( dont know when i got it as it updates in the background) problem first noticed on 8 july 2020. So for now i will have to use Microsoft Edge browser or Opera or maybe Firefox as it just isnt ok anymore on Chrome browser which is my prefered choice of browser.
I worked out that it is Freedar causing the high temperatures if tracking lots of planes ( it tells you how many it is tracking in bottom right of the website what you should do is click list only visible then the number should drop as will your Computers temperature !!!!!
past ( now old & fixed ) issues i have had with freedar include June 2019 when the map would freeze up, use a different browser if you have trouble eg Internet Explorer on Windows 10.
By 8th September 2019 Freedar added audio from ATC to the website after i am told hundreds of people requested this feature. Personally i didnt want this so switched it off.
Be very careful as there were fake copies of Freedar on App stores since June 2018 only get the App via the link i provided or via their Website
My suggestions for Freedar would be to add some info to the left hand side of their website to explain any new changes to the site ( a bit like the layout of fr24 ) All users need a way to see what changes have been made to the Freedar website so they can learn whats new and then use it as quickly as possible. I & most people would not have time to look through lots of information and chat on say a Facebook group ..we need a quick easy log of changes kept in date order ..that suggestion goes for all radar websites.
To mute ATC Audio sound in Internet Explorer Browser you need to right click the speaker icon in the bottom left of your PC screen then open volume mixer and mute IE browser. You can mute any tab on Chrome browsers by right clicking and clicking mute site. ( there is a mute button in Freedar via menu-audio-mute and that does not mute it thats for some other sounds the website can make)
For a couple of days Freedar wasnt working ok but by 26jan2020 they say use http://radar.freedar.uk/VirtualRadar/desktop.html to see the radar after a server rebuild due to a Windows update causing them problems
B4 15dec2020 they’ve added snow icons moving over the screen ! instead of pharting around doing stuff like this please fix the radar service.
31 March 2021 Ben Fry has stepped down from running Freedar he announced on Facebook today , new owner isn’t named yet my useful list of Radars we can use : https://groups.google.com/g/cambridge-airport--east-anglia-plane-spotters/c/eJbCvU63NWc
# Updated area
Use letter size 22 . updates 122pm 24nov2020 , 21 march 2021. , updated 2june21 , 27Nov2023 ,