APRS Connect - Radio Messaging

AxelStack

In-app purchases

About this app

APRS Connect is an APRS client built around messaging. Conversations are threads, not a wall of packets, and everything it puts on the air is visible before it goes.

WORKS WITH YOUR RADIO
• Bluetooth KISS TNC, such as a Mobilinkd
• Bluetooth LE — a TNC4 in LE mode, or a B.B. Link
• USB serial — a TNC on a cable
• Audio modem — no TNC at all: the phone's own audio works AFSK
• KISS over TCP — Direwolf, or a networked TNC
• APRS-IS over the internet
• Save several named radios, run more than one at once, each beacon picking one

MESSAGING
• One thread per station, delivery state read off the air: queued, transmitted, digipeated, acked or failed
• Digipeat confirmation — proof your packet was repeated, not merely transmitted
• Automatic acks, a retry you can stop mid-flight, long messages split and rejoined
• Bulletins in their own room; mute, archive and block

NETS AND GROUPS
• ANSRVR groups become rooms: #APRSThursday, an ARES net, a club group — its traffic in one conversation, not messages from strangers
• Join by name, see how many are subscribed, renew before it lapses, and browse the directory in the app

APRS OTA
• Host an op from anywhere and work the chasers who call in
• The countdown is on screen, and each contact you confirm adds time
• Confirm a contact with a message the chaser gets, and see what you said back
• Chase other ops, the position-report requirement checked for you — including whether RF heard your beacon

SERVICES ARE AN API. THIS IS A FRONT END TO IT
Each APRS service gets a screen: APRS OTA, the SMS and email gateways, WXBOT, WHO-IS, QRX and more. Choose an action and the app writes the command. Switch on "Show APRS commands" and each one first shows the literal message it will send — nothing hidden, and the syntax is there to learn. Edit, export and import the directory.

MAP, AND OFF THE GRID
• Vector map with real APRS symbols, station trails, objects and weather
• Every tile you look at is kept, to a limit you set, and redraws offline
• The whole app runs with no internet — a radio and a TNC is a complete install
• Filter by age, and by whether a station came over RF or the internet
• Choose how precisely your beacons say where you are

STATIONS AND PACKETS
• Every station heard, with distance, bearing and how long ago
• The radio or software behind each station, from its APRS device id
• Weather stations charted, and tracker telemetry plotted the same way
• Mic-E decoded, including its emergency states
• Every packet decoded field by field, raw frame and hex dump — honest about what it could not parse

YOUR DATA IS A FILE YOU CAN READ
• Backup is plain JSON — settings, conversations, blocklist — readable before import
• Merge or restore, with handset settings kept separate for a phone-to-phone move
• The packet log exports as NDJSON, and replays through the parser that recorded it
• A station's track leaves as GPX, or as KML for Google Earth

MAKE IT YOURS
• Several beacon profiles — your station, a second SSID, a fixed object — each with Smart Beaconing or a fixed interval, its own path, symbol and tone
• Message templates, a symbol picker, US or metric units, a 12/24 hour clock, dark mode, APRS-IS filter editing
• Background receive, so the radio keeps being heard with the screen off

YOUR LICENCE, YOUR RESPONSIBILITY
An amateur radio licence is required to transmit; receiving needs none. Everything it puts on the air goes out under your callsign and is your responsibility — including beacons on a timer and acks it sends for you. Operating within your national regulator's rules is on you; in the United States that is FCC Part 97. The app does not verify your licence, callsign or privileges.

APRS carries no encryption, and encrypting amateur traffic is generally prohibited — treat everything you send as permanently public. Do not rely on it for emergencies: it is best-effort, and messages are lost routinely.

APRS is a registered trademark of the APRS Foundation and of Bob Bruninga, WB4APR.

What’s new

Welcome to APRS Connect.
Get on the air with a Bluetooth TNC, a KISS TNC over your network, or APRS-IS: message other operators in proper conversation threads, join net rooms, watch stations move on a live map, beacon your position, and work services like weather, SMS and email gateways.
Your threads, map and packet log all keep working with no connection, and everything exports.
A license is required to transmit. 73, and tell us what to build next.