Phosphor

Phosphor (née adsb-radar), a native macOS aircraft viewer with a vintage military radar display, inspired by Air Defender. Track aircraft from an RTL-SDR receiver, adsb.fi, or an offline synthetic demo. Explore aircraft details, trails, and bundled UK airways, airspace, and airports.

Watch the original 15-second demo: South UK to London

Install the app (recommended)

The signed and notarised application package requires macOS 14 or later and supports Apple Silicon and Intel Macs. No developer tools are needed.

1. Open the latest release and download Phosphor-<version>.zip from Assets.
2. Extract the ZIP and drag Phosphor.app into Applications.
3. Open Phosphor from Applications.

Future updates are available through Phosphor > Check for Updates. Automatic update preferences are in Settings.

Get started

In Settings, save your home coordinates and choose a source:

• Online: live adsb.fi traffic with internet access; no receiver needed.
• Local: an RTL-SDR dongle, antenna, and readsb (brew install readsb).
• Local + Online: both sources in one view.
• Synthetic: offline Test or Demo traffic.

Drag or scroll with two fingers to pan, use the mouse wheel or pinch to zoom around the pointer, and click an aircraft to inspect it. Use Command-0 to return home.

Try the offline demo

Quit any running copy, then launch:

'/Applications/Phosphor.app/Contents/MacOS/Phosphor' --synthetic --scenario demo

Development

To build from source, install Swift 6 developer tools on macOS 14 or later, then run:

./scripts/build-app.sh
open 'build/Phosphor.app'

Use ./scripts/build-app.sh release for a release build in build/release/Phosphor.app and swift test to run the tests. See the usage guide for settings, receiver setup, and manual checks, or the product specification for the accepted design. Signed distribution builds, Sparkle updates, and the GitHub release workflow are covered in the release guide. Phosphor uses a fresh application identity and does not migrate settings or caches from ADSB Radar. Historical verification records retain the names and commands used at the time; use this README and the usage guide for current build commands.

Aircraft data: adsb.fi (personal-use API). Map data: Natural Earth and UK aviation / airport sources.