Hello! Welcome back!
The number in the “Altitude” box is your true altitude - not your flight level (or pressure altitude). That likely explains the difference between this view and the others - they don’t have your true altitude, only pressure.
The reason we have it is that the data you are seeing in that view is coming from Simlink - not VATSIM. That is also why we can provide TAS, despite this being unavailable in the VATSIM data.
Does that make sense, or is it still looking off to you?
Kind Regards,
Malte
Are you saying that Navi gets all the other planes altitude info from simlink and not from vatsim servers? All the planes are off,. Not just mine. Today my indicated (on the bottom is listed at 35009). Im at 350. When i mouse over the plane it says 36400. All the other plane are off making it pretty useless. If your getting the info from vatsim servers it should be accurate since vatsim radar and controllers have the correct altitude. It seems all the planes are listing in true altitude and not indicated. But vatsim uses indicated so this is not useful.
Not all - but almost! There is a significant overlap between VATSIM users and Navigraph users. Where possible, we enhance the data we receive from VATSIM using data we obtain directly from the simulator.
If a position is truly coming from VATSIM only, no TAS is shown:
Yes, that checks out. If you have Simlink running, the value shown in this window for your flight is using true, not indicated.
We are getting an altitude value from VATSIM. The actual reference used is unclear (not documented), but we assume it is indicated. In your case, that value is not shown because of the reasons mentioned above.
This is interesting feedback for sure!
To begin with, we should definitely show the reference for “Altitude”! I agree that this would make the value significantly more useful.
Would you mind outlining your use-case for this value, so I can forward it to the team?
The point of vatsim integration should be to help is see where other planes are and avoid them. Especially when in uncontrolled airspace with no controllers. To avoid them we need accurate altitude info. No one uses actual altitude. They all use indicated. (IRL and in the sim). Navigraph has my actual altitude info. Vat sim servers also have this info. It would be nice to have this info in the charts and not need vatim radar or vatspy as well. But so far the information you have is useless if altitude is not displayed correctly. ( or it he right format)
That might be your use case, and that’s fine! Currently, however, it is designed more as a flight tracker than a TCAS system. You’re not meant to use the map for traffic avoidance in its current state. It would be cool to turn it into such a system in the future, though!
I think I can understand your use case! Although it is not the intended one, it is still reasonable. We shall at least try to make it clear which altitude reference is being used in that information box!
Thank you for the feedback! I will forward it to the team.
Who would want to track vatsim flights at the incorrect altitude? How is that a value to anyone? Also, who would want to track them aside from vatsim users avoiding other traffic? If it wasn’t designed for traffic avoidance, then what is the point at all?
It is a flight tracker. Much like Flightradar24! It shows where ATC is active on a network, and it gives you a nice, real-time glimpse into how big and dedicated the community really is by showing live aircraft positions as well.
I hear that you are imagining a different use case! We’ll consider trying to accomodate it. You are the first and only person to mention this out of the thousands that use the feature every day. I definitely see the point in at least showing the altitude reference, and possibly even switching it out to a barometric one!
Flight radar shows barometric altimeter. So yours unfortunately is nothing like flight radar. Do you have any metric on how many users actually use this feature? Many probably went back to vatsim radar or vatglases when they noticed it didn’t have the needed functionality. Vatsim radar is a resource hog so this would be a better product if it was functional. I can’t think of any use case where someone would prefer true altitude instead of indicated. No one uses true altitude in aviation. Also in the first post i was at flight level 370 and the telematics displayed 32794 under “indicated”. Now in other cases indicated does match, but in that case it did not. The one you label indicated should always match cockpit indicated. I’m not trying to sound like a jerk here, but your defending a product that clearly doesn’t work as it should, and then telling me its correct because no one else complained.
chartfox.org has all the charts I need (for free). We pay for Navigraph because of the added features and integration with planes. So when you add a great feature like vatsim tracking, don’t get defensive when i report the bugs of why it doesn’t work. $110 bucks (USD) a year is not cheap but its worth it if you continue to improve your product.
Sorry, perhaps I was not clear enough! What I meant is: what is Flightradar24 used for? It is not for collision avoidance - that was my point.
We know this is not true because we can see the traffic flowing from our servers. Some may absolutely have switched! Some may even use both - likely for different use cases, just like you are confirming!
Not sure it comes down to preference as much as to people simply not looking at it. If they use the feature for flight tracking, a slight difference in altitude compared to what their own aircraft indicates will not matter at all. If they need to worry about traffic, they have their avionics for that or even TCAS. Perhaps even using their eyes, if VFR!
Hmm, this is odd and unfortunate! I can’t see why this would be - let’s try to figure it out!
First: we can only trust what the simulator is telling us. There could be multiple altimeters on board your aircraft, and the indicated value depends on the pressure it’s tuned to.
Which simulator are you using?
For SimConnect (FSX/P3D/MSFS), we use INDICATED ALTITUDE (docs)
For X-Plane, we use sim/cockpit2/gauges/indicators/altitude_ft_pilot (docs)
Do you see any mistakes here that we may have missed? We are not changing these values in any way - they are reported as-is from the simulator.
Honestly, do you feel that my previous responses have been defensive?
Have I missed any point you have made?
I have explained how the app works and why. I have also pointed out that I agree with you - the reference should definitely be shown - without question. I have also indicated that this is the least we can/should do, and that we should likely re-evaluate the decision to use true altitude.
If you feel that I am still missing something here, I’m sorry! Please let me know. I am doing my best to explain how we ended up in the current situation while still taking in your feedback!
Other issues notwithstanding (like the suitability of a flight tracker as a collision avoidance system), as far as I know, every real flight tracker out there shows the barometric altitude (including Flightradar24, which can also show GPS altitude when available, but that’s in addition to, rather than instead of, the “regular” altitude reading).
As far as I know, none of them will ever display (or attempt to display) true altitude (although GPS altitude might be close enough)?
Some sim-based trackers which have access to the true altitude (Navigraph, Volanta, and IIRC, Sim Toolkit Pro; I have never tried Elevatex or Little Navmap) will show that whenever available, which I personally find immersion-breaking (since it prioritizes data which would not typically be shown or easily available in the real world).
Perhaps more annoying still (and/or my biggest personal criticism regarding this issue), as far as I can tell, neither Volanta nor Navigraph seem to label the source of the altitude information, even though it is not the same for all aircraft being tracked (and the sources may differ by well over a thousand feet with e.g. an ISA deviation of +/-10 °C and a typical airliner’s cruise altitude).
Thus the altitude data shown is not suitable for direct comparison (whether such a direct comparison would have any actually meaningful applications, I am not sure, but the fact that it’s not possible remains an annoyance nevertheless, at least to me).
This is kind of like if Charts only showed one value for “Speed” which came from GS (Simlink data not available) or TAS (Simlink data available).
And indeed, I would personally also prefer it if the barometric altitude were shown for all flights, with true altitude being additional when available, instead of the current either/or situation.
Regards,
Tim
Thank you for the additional input!
To be clear: your wishes are also already covered/addressed by what has been mentioned above, correct?
In short: Use barometric, and show the reference?
Yes, cheers 
Regards,
Tim