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ForeFlight (merged thread)

chflyer wrote:

The 50% increased cost over the Pro Plus plan isn’t justified when Autorouter offers the same thing for free.

Completely agreed a 50% premium over Pro Plus for a GA pilot that only uses the flight planning features is pretty up there (obviously other features, irrelevant to EU GA, exist like PDC and D-ATIS).

That said, it’s just a question how highly you value convenience. I have found recently that FF has safely & reliably become the “one-stop shop” for European GA IFR. The aircraft models I’ve found to be extremely accurate (ok… i don’t fly the most exotic of aircraft) with the ability to calculate fuel burn to within the gallon. That combined with W&B calcs, take-off/landing performance calcs, weather overlays, cloud tops, SigWX charts, GRAMET, NOTAMS, route planning and filing.. all in one place… pretty handy.

VFR however…. totally different story… still totally useless.

EGSX

TimR wrote:

VFR however…. totally different story… still totally useless.

For those of us whose flying in the course of the year is very much a mixture of VFR/IFR, or even within the same flight using a ‘Z’ or ‘Y’ flight plan, the total cost of Foreflight, for me, out-ways the claimed advantage of ‘one-stop shopping’.
After trialing Foreflight twice, I have reverted back to SkyDemon and Autorouter.

Rochester, UK, United Kingdom

That combined with W&B calcs, take-off/landing performance calcs, weather overlays, cloud tops, SigWX charts, GRAMET, NOTAMS, route planning and filing

The other thing to consider is that all of the above can be done using other tools, and you do need to “exercise” these tools at times to make sure you have a backup, because one day you will need it

Most wx related stuff comes from windy.com and that will be as good as anything from anywhere today, and better than anything from GFS which I think FF (being a US product) will be using. Notams and tafs/metars are widely obtainable. Filing is a good point and the Autorouter integrates Eurocontrol routing and filing well (with some non working bits e.g. delaying works only from the telegram interface) but I can file any FP using EuroFPL. And VFR routes don’t need autorouting and usually one can re-use the same route for 10 years, so any service which stores your past flights and can file them (EuroFPL, etc) will do just fine.

Of course convergence is nice to have, and I had loads of hope in FF, but I think their marketing is wrong for Europe, where existing VFR tools are well established and the IFR community is (a) small and (b) has developed all the methods they need over years and (c) has a totally free tool for routing and filing.

FF would pick up a lot of business if the Autorouter disappeared. IFR pilots would have to choose FF or RR. I suspect most of the owner-flown TP/jet crowd is already on RR and has no reason to change since they don’t do any significant VFR.

If FF did the autorouting with fly-by waypoints for shaping the route, and did this on the browser interface, for the $100, I would subscribe right away and give it a go.

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

TimR wrote:

VFR however…. totally different story… still totally useless.
Indeed. Last month, I was flying VFR with a flight instructor for my annual review. He had ForeFlight with him and I used Skydemon. He was totally amazed how clear all airspaces in Skydemon are shown and how easy route planning and flight (de)briefing was, all compared to ForeFlight. At the end, he said he would consider changing his EFB after the end of this years subscription.
Last Edited by Frans at 25 Feb 12:12
Switzerland

I checked these new features in routing and they work ok if the application doesn’t crash which happens pretty often :(

LDZA LDVA, Croatia

Peter_G wrote:

For those of us whose flying in the course of the year is very much a mixture of VFR/IFR, or even within the same flight using a ‘Z’ or ‘Y’ flight plan, the total cost of Foreflight, for me, out-ways the claimed advantage of ‘one-stop shopping’.

FF does not work for VFR/IFR in class G near UK CAS?
Only warnings I got so far were TFRs and Mode C veils and Bravo and I busted all the 3 while talking to someone…

Last Edited by Ibra at 25 Feb 12:55
Paris/Essex, France/UK, United Kingdom

Hi all,

Apologies for not posting sooner as I have been traveling for work.

Just a few points to mention:

  • Route Constraints for Web to match the mobile version is coming shortly.
  • Please continue to email [email protected] with routing concerns or issues. This helps us get them to our routing team efficiently so they can make updates. Many of these are changes are constantly being released as they do not require an app side release.
  • It’s always good to report any crashes to [email protected] so we can collect diagnostics and determine what may be causing the issue.
  • We have made some styling updates to the aeronautical layer after receiving many requests to differentiate Class C and D controlled areas in Europe, as well as, some adding some additional information to special use airspace labels. Blog post: https://blog.foreflight.com/2020/02/27/new-aero-map-changes-in-foreflight/
  • As far as flight planning, I understand where you are coming from here and there are still features that we are continuing to work on. I did want to mention for those who use AutoRouter, there is an option to open a flight plan in ForeFlight which will prompt you to open ForeFlight and adds the flight plan. Just wanted to highlight that flexibility.
  • We have more features that should help improve flying VFR over the next few months and will continue to throughout the year.

I am always here to take your feedback and also pass it on to various teams as well.

All the best,

Josh

FF Director of Product - International
KGTU, United States

Emir wrote:

I checked these new features in routing and they work ok if the application doesn’t crash which happens pretty often :(

I fly with it open all the time and it has crashed maybe once or twice.

EGTK Oxford

JasonC wrote:

I fly with it open all the time and it has crashed maybe once or twice.

Once or twice in which period?

In general it used to be stable but the latest version simply isn’t.

LDZA LDVA, Croatia

Emir wrote:

Once or twice in which period?

In general it used to be stable but the latest version simply isn’t.

The last 6 months.

EGTK Oxford
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