FPV Drones have exploded in popularity in recent years. With so many affordable options now available, it’s easier than ever to get started flying quads as a hobby.
But there’s a lot more to safely and effectively piloting FPV drone than just buying one and taking off. Having the right apps installed on your mobile device can make a huge difference in helping you get the most out of your drone flights.
In this comprehensive guide, we’ll cover the top apps that every beginner FPV pilot should have in their toolkit.
From flight planning and weather monitoring to editing and sharing your aerial footage, these apps will level up your drone game and allow you to capture stunning videos and photos from the sky.
Let’s get started!
Table Of Contents
Flight Planning Apps
Careful planning is key before heading out to fly your drone. These apps provide valuable information to help you scout locations, check for flight restrictions, and visualize shot angles.
1. AirMap
AirMap is the leading provider of aeronautical data & services to unmanned aircraft, or drones.
AirMap is an essential app for hobbyist drone pilots. It lets you easily see airspace restrictions, temporary flight restrictions, and other critical safety information for wherever you plan on flying.
The app shows restricted areas on a map, so you can see if there are any limitations around potential flight locations. This helps ensure you fly safely and legally.
For example, an open field might seem like a safe place to fly. But AirMap may reveal it’s actually under restricted airspace. The app has data on airports, national parks, military locations, and other no-fly zones.
With AirMap, you can:
- Search locations to view airspace advisories and restrictions
- See information like maximum flight heights and speed limits
- Get notified of any changes to airspace restrictions
Being aware of the rules for wherever you fly is vital. AirMap makes this easy and prevents fines for entering unauthorized airspace.
2. DroneAssist
Another handy app for U.K. based drone pilots is DroneAssist. This app serves a similar function to AirMap, providing guidance on airspace restrictions across the United Kingdom.
DroneAssist shows temporary and permanent no fly zones on an interactive map. You can tap on different areas to see specifics on flight limitations, maximum altitudes, and more. It also sends push notifications if restrictions change.
Between AirMap and DroneAssist, you can thoroughly verify that any location you want to fly in is permissible for hobby drones.
3. DJI GeoZone Map
For pilots flying DJI drones like the Mavic, Phantom, or Inspire series, DJI’s GeoZone Map is another great resource.
The GeoZone Map is built into DJI’s GO and Fly apps. It displays DJI’s own data on restricted flying locations. You can check it through the app before taking off or when connected to the drone’s remote controller.
This lets DJI users see airspace limitations specific to their drones. It also provides high quality no fly zone mapping data.
Checking all three apps—AirMap, DroneAssist, and DJI GeoZone Map—will give you the most comprehensive overview of any flight restrictions.
4. Google Earth
Google Earth is an invaluable planning tool for scouting drone flight locations and visualizing potential shots.
With Google Earth, you can search for locations and view 3D rendered landscapes. The high resolution imagery allows you to explore areas from all angles.
This helps you find promising spots to shoot from the air and determine exactly how you want to capture the location. You can identify angles, compositions, and positioning for drone photos and videos.
Plus, Google Earth’s website version enables creating bookmarks, placemarks, and image overlays as you plan your shots.
So before heading out to fly, you can use Google Earth to thoroughly explore shoot locations. This takes the guesswork out of finding the best views from the sky.
5. Notion
For in-depth drone project planning, Notion is an excellent app and web platform. It makes organizing location shoots easy.
Notion acts as an all-in-one workspace for notes, tasks, and collaboration. You can build customized databases, wikis, schedules, and more.
For drone pilots, it’s great for planning shoots and keeping all your notes in one place. You can create shooting checklists, add maps and screenshots, bookmark weather reports, and track progress.
Everything remains synced across your devices. So you can do initial planning on your computer and have all the info accessible on your phone when you’re onsite.
Notion helps keep your drone shoots organized so you can focus on getting great aerial footage. The possibilities are endless for building a productive drone project workspace.
Weather Apps
Monitoring weather and wind conditions is crucial when flying drones. Sudden rain or high winds can force you to cut a shoot short. These apps provide up-to-the-minute information to know when weather may impact your ability to fly.
1. UAV Forecast
UAV Forecast is designed specifically with drone pilots in minds. It provides detailed weather data relevant to operating unmanned aerial vehicles.
The app lets you set maximum wind speed thresholds based on your drone model. It then shows a colored indicator on the map tagging locations currently over that limit.
You can also view forecasts, wind speed, temperature, precipitation probability, and more. Interactive graphs make it easy to analyze conditions over upcoming days.
For new drone pilots, being aware of weather limitations is vital. UAV Forecast takes the guesswork out and helps identify flyable and non-flyable conditions.
2. Windy
For visualizing wind patterns, Windy is one of the best apps available. The map clearly shows wind direction and speed with animated wind vector graphics.
You can instantly see where wind speeds are high vs low in any location. This helps when positioning your drone to avoid facing the strongest gusts.
Windy also incorporates data layers for things like weather radar, temperature, cloud cover, and wave height. It’s a top choice for drone pilots needing detailed wind visualization.
3. Weather Window
Knowing whether an upcoming morning or sunset sky will be clear or cloudy can make all the difference in getting good drone shots. Weather Window provides forecasts tailored towards landscape photography that are also helpful for drone piloting.
The app shows cloud cover predictions for the next few days. You can quickly see which sunrises and sunsets are expected to have the clearest skies.
For drone pilots looking to capture these magical golden hour shots, Weather Window makes it easy to identify prime conditions.
4. Wind Compass
When standing on the ground, wind direction isn’t always obvious. But when your drone is 100+ feet in the air, knowing the wind direction becomes critical.
The Wind Compass app uses your phone’s sensors to precisely show wind direction. Just point your phone around and you can see which way the wind is blowing in real-time.
With this info, you can position your takeoff and landing approaches appropriately to avoid flying your drone directly into a heavy headwind.
Editing Apps
A good editing app enables you to assemble and share drone footage right from your mobile device. Here are excellent options for both quick edits and more advanced post-processing.
1. CapCut
CapCut is a user-friendly editing app that’s great for quick drone video compilations. The intuitive interface makes adding clips, transitions, and music simple.
Handy tools like speed adjustment and filter presets help polish your shots without needing complex editing knowledge. CapCut also supports chroma key editing if you want to replace backgrounds.
For mobile editing, CapCut strikes a nice balance of pro features and ease of use. You can create short shareable drone highlight reels in just a few minutes.
2. VN Video Editor
For more professional editing capabilities, VN Video Editor is a go-to choice. The app provides a timeline based multi-track video editor optimized for mobile.
Robust clip manipulation tools, audio adjustments, color grading, and a library of transitions and effects are included. You can create complete produced drone videos entirely on your phone.
VN also enables seamless exporting to YouTube, Facebook, and Instagram. For serious hobby drone shooters, this app has all you need to edit engaging aerial content.
3. InShot
InShot packs a surprising amount of editing power into a free mobile app. It supports up to 8 video, image, audio, and text layers.
The editor features common tools like trimming, filters, titles, transitions, and animation effects. Quick auto stabilization smooths out shaky drone footage. And you can export videos up to 4K resolution.
For casual hobby drone pilots who don’t need advanced editing, InShot is an excellent free option for polishing your clips to share online.
4. Splice
Splice keeps video editing straightforward with a streamlined timeline editor. It lacks some of the fancier features seen in other apps but excels at the basics.
The app makes it fast to combine drone clips, add transitions between them, adjust audio, apply filters, and export your final edit.
For quick editing workflows, Splice is easy to learn and use. The simple toolkit enables creating short shareable drone video stories with a professional look.
Telemetry Overlay Apps
Viewing flight telemetry like speed, altitude, and drone orientation overlaid on your videos can help document your flights and make for engaging footage. These apps make adding this data simple.
1. Kittyhawk
Kittyhawk provides an integrated suite of drone tools, including helpful mobile apps for both iOS and Android.
The Kittyhawk mobile app can connect to your drone controller to capture real-time telemetry. It records GPS position, altitude, speed, orientation, and video signal strength.
This data can then be easily overlaid on your video recordings. Having the hard flight stats displayed makes for exciting first-person-view drone footage.
Kittyhawk also offers logbook functionalities to keep records of all your flights in one place. If you fly DJI drones, it’s a top choice for enhanced analytics.
2. AirData UAV
Another great option compatible with most commercial drones is AirData UAV. Like Kittyhawk, it provides real-time overlay displays of distance, altitude, speed, and more.
The free mobile app even creates dynamic gauges to showcase flight information. This takes your drone footage to the next level when it comes to capturing immersive FPV-style video.
AirData UAV also integrates with drones to read battery voltages and current draw for monitoring power levels during flight.
3. DECENTER Home
For DJI drone pilots, DECENTER Home enables real-time telemetry overlays directly within DJI’s standard GO 4 app. No switching between multiple apps is required.
After connecting, data like altitude, speed, satellite count, and home point distance are shown overlaid across live video feeds. There are also digital horizon and compass widgets.
Having this info continually displayed in DJI GO is super handy. DECENTER makes DJI app integration seamless for adding engaging telemetry data to your drone videos.
Pilot Logs
Logging each flight session is good practice for all drone pilots. It creates helpful documentation and improves safety and organization.
1. AirData UAV
We already covered how AirData UAV provides excellent telemetry overlays. But the app also serves as a comprehensive flight logger.
AirData UAV can automatically track detailed flight info including distance, max height, location, battery charge, and aircraft position.
The built-in logbook makes accessing past flights easy. You can see totals, averages, and records for things like distance, altitude, and max speed.
For both casual and professional drone operators, keeping proper flight records is essential. AirData UAV makes this a breeze.
2. Kittyhawk
Similar to AirData UAV, Kittyhawk offers integrated flight logging in addition to their real-time telemetry features.
Each flight’s key details are neatly organized into the logbook section of the Kittyhawk app. You can review past flights, export data to share, and analyze summaries.
The advanced logging uses aircraft connection to ensure accuracy. Detailed records help identify issues and improve your piloting over time.
3. UAV Coach
UAV Coach provides a streamlined and inexpensive (just $1.99) flight logging option. You can create and manage aircraft profiles and individual pilot accounts.
For each flight, you log details like location, duration, aircraft, and environmental conditions. The app makes adding photos, videos, and notes simple as well.
Advanced users can even connect to flight controllers to automatically log telemetry. But manual flight entry works great for most hobby drone use.
With multi-pilot support, UAV Coach is fantastic for clubs and groups looking to keep organized records during practice flights, races, and events.
AR Tracking Apps
Augmented reality apps that track aircraft position in real-time provide a cool perspective on your drone flights. They showcase your piloting skills from a realistic third-person view.
1. Oxford Sky AR
Sky AR from software company OxfordSMART offers an extremely impressive augmented reality drone tracker. The app uses your phone’s camera and sensors to detect aircraft location and orientation in 3D space.
As you fly your drone, you’ll see it rendered virtually from the perspective of your mobile device. This creates an immersive AR view of your flight maneuvers.
The app can connect to telemetry streams for precise tracking. But it also does a great job of estimating aircraft position when flying manually.
Sky AR is free to try with a premium subscription ($8 per month) enabling extended use. Seeing your flights play out live in AR is an unforgettable experience.
2. AR Drones
AR Drones provides a similar AR tracking platform tailored for DJI drones. It also visualizes your drone’s movement in augmented reality but uses WiFi connectivity for more precise positioning.
The app is free to download and try. You can unlock unlimited usage for a one-time $4.99 in-app purchase.
For DJI pilots wanting to showcase their flight skills from an external AR view, this is a great option for immersive FPV-style filming.
Sun Position Apps
Knowing the position of the sun is hugely beneficial when planning drone flights. These augmented reality apps provide interactive overlays to track the sun’s path.
1. Sun Surveyor
With Sun Surveyor, you hold your phone camera to the sky and it displays an AR overlay of the sun and moon positions. You can track their rising, transit, and setting spots throughout the day.
The app factors geographic location, horizon elevation, and day of the year to ensure alignment accuracy.
For drone pilots, visualizing sun and moon location is super helpful for timing flights around dawn, dusk, and optimal lighting conditions. The AR view makes it easy to anticipate prime photo spots.
2. PhotoPills
Going beyond just sun positioning, PhotoPills provides a full suite of useful shoot planning features for photographers.
The AR mode enables tracking sun, moon, and Milky Way positioning across time. You can also plot star trails over real-time camera views.
PhotoPills offers tons more shoot planning resources as well like depth of field calculators, hyperfocal distance tables, and plots of golden hour and blue hour timing.
For hobby drone pilots serious about photography, PhotoPills is an invaluable toolkit. The AR technology and planning capabilities help maximize your chances of capturing jaw-dropping aerial views.
Project Management Apps
When tackling complex multi-session drone projects, specialized tools to track progress and coordinate team members can be hugely beneficial.
1. Airdata Link
Airdata Link enables advanced project management by tying in with UAV Forecast and AirData UAV. It complements the capabilities of those apps nicely.
You can create multiple projects and use built-in templates for common drone use cases like 3D Photogrammetry Mapping flights.
Detailed checklists help you manage all pre-flight preparations, mission execution items, and post-flight tasks. You can also invite team members to collaborate.
For professional drone operators working on mapping, surveying, or inspection projects, Airdata Link streamlines coordination and planning.
2. Litchi Hub
Litchi Hub works hand-in-hand with the Litchi flight control app for DJI drones. It provides powerful tools for managing complex flights beyond waypoints.
Within Litchi Hub, you can build step-by-step mission timelines incorporating things like camera actions, orientation changes, and pauses. Waypoint flying is just one small piece.
Projects can include multiple missions with variable parameters and conditions. You can even create custom triggers and variables to use in advanced mission logic.
For DJI pilots taking on high intensity projects, Litchi Hub removes the headaches of complex flight coordination. The intuitive interface makes building detailed timelines and logic easy.
3. DroneHarmony
DroneHarmony positions itself as professional drone operations software. It offers an extremely deep toolbox centered around visual mission planning, collaboration, and automation.
You can build interactive maps incorporating flight boundaries, obstacles, checklists, instructions, and practically any other information worth tracking. Cloud sync keeps everything up-to-date across devices.
Detailed flight plans can be created with input windows, conditional logic, and live telemetry monitoring. Even real-time in-flight alerting and automated notifications are supported.
For commercial operators managing a drone fleet across large projects, DroneHarmony provides unparalleled oversight and coordination. The sophisticated platform caters to the most demanding enterprise usage.
Drone Training Apps
Improving your flight skills takes practice. These apps provide drone simulators to sharpen your reflexes and mastery over the controls before flying expensive equipment.
1. DJI Virtual Flight
DJI’s free Virtual Flight app provides a realistic simulation of flying DJI drones. It connects to DJI remotes and fully emulates popular models like the Mavic 2 and Phantom 4.
You can practice manual flight skills and test out autonomous QuickShots like helix circling and rocket ascending.
The physics modeling recreates real drone behavior. Challenging weather conditions and obstacles encourage precision control.
For DJI pilots, Virtual Flight is by far the most true-to-life simulator available. Take advantage of it to acquire and polish your abilities before heading outside.
2. FPV Freerider Recharged
FPV Freerider Recharged simulates freestyle and racing drones. It delivers a hyper-realistic first-person view flying experience with speedy response and detailed physics.
The simulator accommodates popular FPV remote transmitters. You can also fly using touchscreen controls.
Dozens of customizable tracks with obstacles are included to test your skills. The challenges will prepare you to handle real FPV drones with practiced control muscle
3. Liftoff
Speaking of race courses, Liftoff is another FPV simulator perfect for practicing on actual drone racing maps. It recreates over 85 real world tracks in stunning detail.
Liftoff also models popular miniquad drones for extremely realistic performance. This allows racers to memorize the tracks and develop strategies.
For honing general FPV flight abilities, the Physics Playground in Liftoff is great. You can generate randomabstract courses filled with obstacles. This improves your freestyle maneuvering with tight gaps and complex routes.
On top of that, Liftoff also now supports multiplayer racing against others.
Final Thoughts
That wraps up over 30 of the top mobile apps every drone pilot should have in their toolkit. From planning your flights, executing complex maneuvers, and editing aerial footage, these apps help you get the most out of your drone.
Here are some key takeaways:
- Flight planning apps like AirMap, DroneAssist, and DJI GeoZone help you scout locations and check for airspace restrictions.
- Weather monitoring apps including UAV Forecast, Windy, and Weather Window provide vital data to safely operate your drone.
- Telemetry overlays via Kittyhawk, AirData UAV, and DECENTER Home let you capture immersive FPV-style videos.
- Augmented reality apps like Sky AR and AR Drones give you a live external view of your flight maneuvers.
- Advanced project management platforms such as Airdata Link, Litchi Hub, and DroneHarmony coordinate complex multi-session shoots.
And many more specialized tools exist to fit your particular drone use cases. Building your app arsenal enables capturing cinematic footage, flying more accurately, practicing new maneuvers safely, and getting the most enjoyment out of your drone.
As regulations evolve and drones continue proliferating, expect the app ecosystems to grow even more robust. For now, this guide should have you covered with the most useful mobile apps currently available for drone enthusiasts.
Never be afraid to experiment with new tools you discover as well. Enjoy the skies!
