AOPA Pilot Magazine - June 2013 - 36

BRIEFING

PILOT PRODUCTS

Android
arrives
Tablets are finally ready for aviation
B Y I A N J. T W O M B LY

LAST FALL IT WAS ESTIMATED that 70,000 Android
tablets and roughly 1.2 million Android phones are
activated every day. There are 700,000 Android applications that have been downloaded more than 15
billion times. Those are staggering numbers that highlight Android’s estimated 75 percent of the worldwide
smartphone market. But Android has been playing
catch up in the tablet market. There are now dozens
of Android tablets, if not hundreds, on the market.
Other than stiff competition from the iPad, the
biggest impediment to Android’s adoption in the
cockpit has probably been a lack of aviation-specific
applications. Android is open source and works on
multiple devices from multiple manufacturers. It
also has numerous versions. That leads to complications for developers. Between a smaller market and
increased difficulty to get the application to work, it
makes sense that developers have stayed away. Now
more applications are coming to the Android market.
Pilots looking at purchasing a tablet today have
two options—Apple’s iPad or not. The “not” category
can be anything from a basic $200 off-brand tablet to
one costing hundreds of dollars. Although the number of choices seems overwhelming, it presents an
advantage for pilots. Because you can shop for size,
weight, price, and form factor, it will be easy to find
one that fits your budget and cockpit.
Foreflight may be the leader in all-in-one flight
bag applications for Apple, but it’s nowhere to be
found on Android. And that’s unlikely to change. CEO
Tyson Weihs has said that developing for Android
simply doesn’t make sense for the company. His
sentiments are echoed by many other top Apple aviation developers, but not all. In the Google Play store
you will find AOPA’s FlyQ Pocket, Garmin Pilot, and
WingX.
Some of the top-rated applications were, not surprisingly, purpose built for Android. Here are a few of
our favorites, although they do not represent all the
great applications currently available.
EMAIL ian.twombly@aopa.org

36 | AOPA PILOT June 2013

AVILUTION
Avilution’s one-stop navigation
tool is all you could hope for
from a tablet-based aviation
application. Features such as
a full chart suite, flight planning with
airways,
weather
briefings,
weather
overlay,
user
waypoints, third-party weather
device support, and airport
information that we’ve come to
expect are all here. There are a
few unique or unusual features,
such as split screen, and a flight
segment-specific notepad that
has prefilled slots for takeoff
information, holding, and more.
Users can also draw on the
maps to create traffic patterns,
holds, or anything else they
need to visualize.
Price: $54.95 a year with autorenewal or $74.95 a year for
one-time sign-up

GARMIN PILOT
When you hear Garmin you automatically think great user interface, lots of data, and stable
platform. Garmin Pilot delivers
on all fronts. It has detailed
airport
information, all
the normal
charts and
approach
plates, weather downloads and
overlays, and ADS-B in-flight
weather support. You also
can receive georeferenced
approach plates and SafeTaxi,
Garmin’s georeferenced airport
diagrams.
Price: 30-day free trial, then
$49.99 a year, not including
$49.99 a year for georeferenced approach plates and
$29.99 a year for SafeTaxi.

APPROACH CHARTS
This basic application from
BBFlight, LLC. is a simple
presentation of only the FAA’s
instrument approach procedure
charts. Approach Charts is
simple, easy to use, and a great
resource for these important

documents. It opens to a simple
screen with a field for airport
identification, city, or state. Enter one of those and the charts
automatically download and are
listed as ready for use offline,
categorized by airport identifier. Click on the star and that
airport is saved as a favorite.
One of the unique features of
Approach Charts is the ability to search for plates with a
route. Type in
your departure
airport identification, “TO,” and
then the arrival
airport, and the
application will
download all the
charts for every
airport along the route.
Price: $9.99 one-time purchase
that includes lifetime updates

AVIATION POCKETKNIFE
Aviation Pocketknife includes
14 categories
of conversions,
calculators, and
general information. Included is
everything from
airport information and approach plates to
time, fuel, distance calculators,
a crosswind calculator, and an
international aircraft registration guide. This application
may not give you everything
you need, but the price is right.
Price: Free

ZULULOG
The Zululog
application is
one of the most
popular on
Android, and
it’s also one of
the best. It can
be used either
as a standalone
application
or in sync with the desktop
version. The logbook can track
any flight regime you can throw
at it, as well as keep up with
your currencies and flight time
totals. It also includes a flight
timer and a “flashlight.”
Price: Free

AOPA Pilot Magazine - June 2013

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