What Is ADSB.im?

Updated

ADSB.im is the home of the ADS-B Feeder Image, a ready-made software image that turns your own hardware into a receiver for aircraft, ship, and weather-balloon signals. It is aimed at people who want to plot nearby traffic on their own map and share that data with public aggregators, without assembling a feeder stack by hand. The easiest path is a single-board computer (SBC) image, which the project describes as the most tested and least error-prone option.

What the Feeder Image actually does

The image started as a simpler way to set up an ADS-B feeder, and has since grown to cover several signal types:

  • ADS-B — track aircraft, see recent tracks, altitude, speed, and for many commercial flights even the flight route.
  • AIS — track ships.
  • Sonde — track weather balloons.
  • ACARS / VDL2 / HFDL — receive data transmissions from aircraft to ground stations.

Each of these areas has its own aggregators and communities, but they share the same setup approach through the Feeder Image.

Sharing your data with aggregators

One of the main reasons to run a feeder is to contribute to public networks. ADSB.im lists a long set of supported aggregators you can feed, including adsb.lol, Fly Italy Adsb, TheAirTraffic, adsb.fi, sdrmap, 1090MHz UK, ADS-B Exchange, ADSBHub, HPRadar, airplanes.live, AVDelphi, FlightAware, FlightRadar24, OpenSky Network, Plane.watch, Plane Finder, Planespotters.net, AirNav Radar, Radar Virtuel, and more.

You can plot aircraft on your own map first, then forward the same data outward.

Installation options

There are several ways to install the ADS-B Feeder Image, depending on where and how you want to run things. When in doubt, the project recommends starting with an SBC image.

Method Difficulty Notes
Single Board Computer image Easiest Most tested, fewest pitfalls
DietPi Easy Alternative install path
Linux More advanced For users comfortable with a full Linux setup

Most people appear to use Raspberry Pis, though several other boards are supported.

Step-by-step: SBC image install

  1. Start with one of the supported single board computers.
  2. Add an SDR radio dongle and an antenna.
  3. Download the matching SD-card image and write it to an SD card.
  4. Boot your SBC and wait. Depending on the model and specific image this usually takes a few minutes, but in some cases it can take 15 to 20 minutes.
  5. If you have wired Ethernet, or after you have configured WiFi, go to http://adsb-feeder.local. If mDNS isn't working on your home network, use my.adsb.im, which should redirect you to your new ADS-B feeder.

If you plan to use WiFi

If you weren't able to configure WiFi while writing the SD card, the image creates a WiFi hotspot named adsb.im-feeder that you can connect to in order to finish setup.

What you need before starting

  • A supported single-board computer.
  • An SDR radio dongle.
  • An antenna.
  • An SD card to write the image to.
  • A wired Ethernet connection, or a way to join the adsb.im-feeder hotspot to configure WiFi.

Common sticking points

  • mDNS not resolving. adsb-feeder.local depends on mDNS working on your network. If it doesn't, fall back to my.adsb.im.
  • First boot taking a while. Don't assume something is broken if the initial boot runs long; 15 to 20 minutes is within the expected range for some models and images.
  • WiFi not pre-configured. You can still recover by connecting to the adsb.im-feeder hotspot the image creates.

If your goal is simply to get an aircraft-tracking feeder running with minimal fiddling, the SBC image is the intended starting point. If you want to run it inside an existing Linux environment, that path exists but is described as more advanced.