ADS-B Exchange
How to set up a connection to ADS-B Exchange
Last updated
How to set up a connection to ADS-B Exchange
Last updated
Per 01-MAR-2025, ADS-B Exchange discontinued the "ADSBx Flight Sim Traffic API" RAPID API service that had previously been used by LiveTraffic. LiveTraffic v4.2 now supports the "ADSBexchange.com" RAPID API service, which at the time of writing is available for a monthly fee but not in a freemium model.
Using data of ADS-B Exchange is via a subscription through RapidAPI, which requires you to register with RapidAPI, and subscribe to ADSBEx's API. Please also see ADSBEx's usage . If interested in API details see .
Find them in > Input Channels > ADS-B Exchange:
ADS-B Exchange
Disabled, inactive
ADSBX Radar View
API Key
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...RAPID API requests left...
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If ADSBEx is running with a RapidAPI key, then LiveTraffic shows the remaining quota as reported by RapidAPI, and when the counter (i.e. your subscription month) resets.
LiveTraffic and its author are not affiliated with ADS-B Exchange or RAPID API, and I don't receive any gratitudes etc.
To connect to ADS-B Exchange via RapidAPI do as follows:
All plans include a limited number of requests per month. Read the plans' conditions to understand what happens after the request limit is exceeded, so if access just stops or if you pay a (probably high) pay-as-you-go price for every single additional request made by LiveTraffic. You can influence how often LiveTraffic sends requests and hence how long such a request budget lasts!
Would you configure LiveTraffic's refresh period to be 30s, then LiveTraffic would send only 2 requests per minute and the 10,000 request quota lasts for 83 hours. The downside is that longer refresh rates will lead to less accurate plane movement. Play with the refresh period to find your personal sweet spot.
RAPID API's information about remaining requests seems inaccurate, not moving, as per FEB-2025. The information when the counter resets, i.e. when your subscription month restarts, seems accurate.
Enables usage of as a live flight data channel. This setting is only available if you filled in an API key in the next field.
This link opens the , in which you can check coverage, centered on your current simulated location. The same link appears on the .
Paste or enter your API Key into this edit field. See for how to come by an API key. A button "Test and Save key" appears when you enter the key: Click the button to have LiveTraffic send a test request to ADS-B Exchange for validation of the key. If the test succeeded the key is saved to your settings and the channel enabled, otherwise not.
The button toggles if the key is shown as clear text or hidden as stars.
ADS-B Exchange offers data access through . At the time of writing this documentation there is only one pricing plan available for 10 USD per month and a request limit of 10,000 requests. Please check available plans on .
Register with , click on the "Sign up" link on their homepage and follow instructions for creating an account. Registration by itself is free.
Go to the and select a plan by clicking its "Subscribe" button. You will be asked for credit card details.
Now you need to get you API key: Go to any one of the "Endpoints" pages, e.g. , and find your API key in the parameter x-rapidapi-key consisting of a long series of 50 digits and letters. They can be copied from the Code Snippets on the right hand side, for example like in the following screenshot, which had selected the Target "Shell" and Client "cURL":
Back in LiveTraffic, paste this key into Settings > Input Channels > ADS-B Exchange > API Key, , and click on "Test and Save key".
LiveTraffic sends requests in regular intervals as configured in Live data refresh in the . By default this is every 20 seconds, or 3 requests per minute.
If your API request quota is, say 10,000 requests per month (the Basic plan's limit as of FEB-2025), then this converts to 3,333 minutes = 55.5 hours of simulation time. And you can further extend these hours if you .
LiveTraffic shows the number of remaining API requests of your monthly quota in the Channel Settings, see . This information is returned by RapidAPI with every network response received. It is not tracked by LiveTraffic. Hence it should be fairly accurate...but:
On RAPID API, find information about your ongoing subscriptions and ways to cancel them in your personal .
You can (and probably should) also monitor your usage directly at RapidAPI. RapidAPI has some .
If your are running an ADS-B receiver please consider to grow all our network.
