FlightGear Flight Simulator

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FlightGear Flight Simulator

Developers
	FlightGear.org developers & contributors
Release dates
Windows	November 6, 2020
macOS (OS X)	November 6, 2020
Linux	November 6, 2020
Taxonomy
Monetization	Freeware
Modes	Singleplayer, Multiplayer
Genres	Simulation, Vehicle simulator
Series	FlightGear Flight Simulator

FlightGear Flight Simulator
FlightGear Flight Simulator	2007

The FlightGear Flight Simulator 2020.3 Long Term Support (LTS) (shortened to FlightGear 2020.3) is a free, open-source, multi-platform, cooperative flight simulator development project made by FlightGear.org. It also simulates space flight in Earth's orbit.

FlightGear's flight dynamics engine (JSBSim) is used in a 2015 NASA benchmark to judge new simulation code to the standards of the space industry.

FlightGear 2020.3 has over 700 aircraft and spacecraft projects that can be filtered by advancement level in art/FDM/systems in the launcher's browser. The rest are available through 3rd party hangars or from development repositories. It's used professionally for research and development, and is available for home desktop or DiY project users.

Note: The project is a bit different from "arcade" commercial flight simulations and flight games. It's more Linux scientific software. Being opensource, the sim has received development form the science and engineering community . Some aspects of the sim presentation, features, and project itself may go against gamey software practices/norms. Examples:

Multiple release streams. The Long Term Stable (LTS) releases are for most people. They receive regular stabilised features, and bug fixes which can continue after the next LTS. Current release is 2020.3, and the previous LTS release was 2018.3. In addition, the FlightGear project releases development previews, and nightly builds of the branch for the next LTS - often with significant features - e.g. support for VR headsets in the next branch after 2020.3 (called 2020.4 for now). These installs can exist side-by-side, and are aimed at power users, contributors, and the curious. Stability is taken more seriously than in games.

Aircraft project updates since last LTS listed in changelogs are updated by the launcher before flying the moment they are available, and are often available for the previous LTS if compatible. The next branch has in-development aircraft. Scenery models and terrain improvements are automatically downloaded on demand.

The sim is a command-line program like a lot of Linux software, and the launcher UI and the in-sim UI don't cover absolutely everything - e.g. highest AA settings. Command-line options change a property tree. You can enter command-line options via the launcher, or edit the property tree using the in-sim menu, however.

FlightGear 2020.3 was released for Windows, macOS, and Linux on the website on 6 Nov. 2020. The release version was 2020.3.2. The current release as of Sept. 2022, is 2020.3.13, or 11th update since launch. See 2020.3 Changelog. Currently there is no development preview active, just the next branch with nightly releases.

2020.3.7 added automatic downloading of 3d models of buildings, roads, cities etc. , based on Open StreetMap (OSM) data and automatic generation, for the whole world. This is intended to be used alongside Project 3000 extra airport scenery.

Addons in the official repository, like RedGriffinATC, have been updated since release. As of 2020.3.13, addons need to be downloaded manually, unlike aircraft in the official repository.

Next branch

The next branch is available on the nightly build server (Windows and Mac). Compiled via a script on Linux.

As of Sept. 2022, VR headset users should look at the next branch (mainly tested on Linux) .

Users wanting the Garmin 1000 (FG1000) glass cockpit on Cessna 172S Skyhawk SP should look at the next branch.

Availability

Source	DRM	Notes	Keys	OS
Developer website		GPL source code is also available.

Monetization

Type	Notes
Freeware	yes

Microtransactions

Type	Notes
No microtransactions	None

Game data

Configuration file(s) location

System	Location
Windows	%USERPROFILE%\FlightGear\
macOS (OS X)	~/Library/Application Support/FlightGear
Linux	~/.fgfs/

The user data location is known as $FG_HOME, it can be changed in many ways, including as an OS environment variable. It's where files for all types of user options and data are stored. There also sub-folders where significant amounts of downloaded data are stored e.g. Terrain data as you fly (TerraSync data), aircraft, etc. If you eventually run out of space on a small harddrive this is where to clean out some data for regions you don't fly in. See wiki for details.

It's possible to change the location of different types of data stored in $FG_HOME sub directories - e.g. terrain or aircraft folders in a separate data drive. You can use Launcher > Settings > Downloads > Show more > change Downloads path for scenery and aircraft.

Some settings are not saved between sessions, if you want to set these to be saved, or just change start up values, you can just create an XML file and load it using the --config option. This applies to any property in the property tree e.g. startup state properties for specific aircraft, or new custom properties you create for your projects.

Custom scenery and aircraft folders can be anywhere, and can be added through the launcher (Launcher > Add-ons) as well as through any way that accepts FG command-line options.

FlightGear 3.0 to FlightGear 2018.3 stored data in %USERPROFILE%\Documents\FlightGear. Versions before FlightGear 3.0 used %APPDATA%\flightgear.org\ on Windows. If FlightGear data in an old location is found users will be prompted to move data to the new location, to save bandwidth re-downloading terrain, aircraft etc.

Save game data location

{

System	Location
Windows	%USERPROFILE%\FlightGear\aircraft-data
macOS (OS X)
Linux

Aircraft that can save complete state in mid-flight e.g. the Space Shuttle, Cessna 172P etc. have xml files in $FG_HOME\aircraft-data, or a subfolder like aircraft-data\SpaceShuttleSave. Aircraft that save some preferences or partial state will also use this folder.

Video

Graphics feature	State	Notes
Widescreen resolution		Arbitrary resolution support. Configure via Launcher > settings > show more > window size > custom size, or through relevant command-line option.
Multi-monitor		Extremely versatile in type and combination of monitors used. See configuring view windows , how to activate multi core and multi GPU support and data/docs/README.multiscreen.
Ultra-widescreen
4K Ultra HD
Field of view (FOV)		Default keys: X and x to change FoV. Zooming in and out is meant to be used when clicking on 3d cockpits. Use extreme FoV like binoculars when looking at environment, or from airport tower views. ~0.1 to 120 degrees by default. See FlightGear Wiki: FoV article.
Windowed
Borderless fullscreen windowed
Anisotropic filtering (AF)
Anti-aliasing (AA)		Use launcher. See wiki. Use command-line options to get higher AA: --prop:/sim/rendering/multi-samples=N, valid values for N are 2x, 4x, 8x, 16x. Tansparency anti-aliasing (NVIDIA) or Adaptive anti-aliasing (AMD) can help with ground detail with overlays on
Vertical sync (Vsync)		To hit Vsync limits, unlock FPS throttle from in-sim menu > view > rendering.
60 FPS and 120+ FPS		No limit once unlocked. Unlock FPS throttle from in-sim menu > view > rendering.
High dynamic range display (HDR)
Ray tracing (RT)

Input

Input is a complex topic. FlightGear allows complete control and interfacing with hardware, for more professional and DiY cockpit/hardware settings.

See Input devices wiki page to start, and interfacing for custom/complex hardware configurations.

For basic home use flight specific hardware like Joysticks (flight sticks), Yokes, and Rudder Pedals are often used. Throttles (throttle quadrants) are less common.

Control axes from input can be used in any way to operate flight control surfaces - see common plane surfaces. This includes 2 axes from a mouse. Note for helicopters: Joysticks have a constant centering force, and don't reflect the way sticks work on helicopters - one solution is to remove springs if possible, another is to use a mouse for stick axes (or dual mouse on Linux) - see Helicopter flying. Buttons/sliders/throttles from joysticks, keypads, or custom devices can also be set up to control different things in different contexts.

FlightGear can recognise input devices with profiles in XML text files. These profiles are just a starting point, and can be customised for the aircraft you fly. See latest Joystick inputs, and other input. See the hardware section on the forum and stickied threads for more profiles - console/gamepad controller profiles are also available.

There is a Joystick menu that gives limited customisability (as aircraft and possible uses for buttons/axes are too diverse). There is a fgjs/jsdemo configuration utility for new/unknown hardware.

In a simulation, UI control options will always be restrictive. Aircraft are too diverse e.g. hotair balloon / flying animal like pterasaur / supersonic jet / ground effect vehicle / helicopter / Space Shuttle . Hardware varies a lot. Good input schemes needs tweaking text files. Control standardisation you may have seen elsewhere comes at the cost of fake physics/controls.

Some common controls like joysticks with a constant centering force are unsuitable altogether for helicopter stick controls. The most needed range of motion for physical aircraft controls, needs to map to a compromise for the available range of the home control device. For example helicopter sticks have a large range of motion, but helicopters are flown with small wrist motions e.g. while resting the hand on a leg. The range of input will differ by typical activity - e.g. transport flying to aerobatics.

You should adjust sensitivities and controls first for each aircraft for your specific hardware - if having difficulty flying or finding control response unusual - including before reporting control sensitivity issues.

The sim supports various hardware for headtracking (video) such as input devices supported by protocols/software like OpenTrack (lot of input sources including Occulus and wiimote ), FaceTrackNoIR (camera input), Linux Track (TrackIR, camera, wiimote input), Wii remote head tracking - see head tracking. There are addons for a lot of these.

Keyboard and mouse, touch	State	Notes
Remapping		Possible to have complex key remap bindings, combinations, contexts for different keypad hardware or joystick buttons (not just keyboard) and aircraft. Done via editing XML files. See Howto:Reassign_keyboard_bindings.
Mouse acceleration
Mouse sensitivity		Done via XML files for different axes in different contexts, completely customisable. Simple sensitivity via menu on post-2020.3 nightlies. Keyboard + mouse control possible, but harder to fly most aircraft without an axis for rudder. Use LMB+mouse movement for rudder, or less preferably use auto-coordination. Can use mouse for stick axes for helicopters if centering force on joystick is uncomfortable. Defaults are Tab ↹ to cycle mouse control modes: aircraft flight control, cockpit & UI manipulation (Ctrl+c to highlight interactive elements), view.
Mouse input in menus		2 schemes: old RMB to look around in all 3 mouse modes, use RMB to cycle modes. Users are expected to move camera around to emulate moving head around to better look at cockpit, see data/mice.xml for controls in modes (e.g. hold Ctrl or RMB + mouse movement).
Mouse Y-axis inversion
Touchscreen optimised
Controller
Controller support		Search forum hardware section for more controller profiles.
Full controller support
Controller remapping
Controller sensitivity
Controller Y-axis inversion

Controller types

XInput-compatible controllers

PlayStation controllers

Tracked motion controllers

Generic/other controllers		All sorts of flight hardware. Search forum hardware section for more hardware profiles.
Button prompts

Audio

Audio feature	State	Notes
Separate volume controls
Surround sound
Subtitles
Closed captions
Mute on focus lost
EAX support
Royalty free audio

Localizations

See FGData/translations for new language updates to the latest 2020.3 LTS release.

Language	UI	Audio	Sub	Notes
English
Simplified Chinese				Not sure if simplified or traditional
Dutch
French				Translated manual.
German				Translated manual.
Italian				Translated manual.
Polish				Translated manual.
Russian
Turkish
Slovak				Translated manual.
Spanish				Translated manual.

Network

FlightGear has it's own native multiplayer network, with dual control for aircraft that support it (genuine shared cockpits - not just switching control between players). Multiplayer supports activities like mid-air refueling, aerotow, or fire fighting. See How to: Multiplayer.

FlightGear also supports connecting to the cross-sim VATSIM network with the ability to render craft flown in other sims with the equivalents from its large database (Sept. 2022 - the beta VATSCIM client, swift, is also supported).

Multiplayer types

Type	Native	Notes
Local play
LAN play
Online play

Other information

API

Executable	32-bit	64-bit	Notes
Windows
macOS (OS X)
Linux

Middleware

No middleware information; you can edit this page to add it.

System requirements

System requirements for FlightGear is a complex topic. A large range of hardware is supported than normally expected - as FlightGear is an opensource scientific and engineering software historically from the Linux community, and is run on non-gaming (e.g. weak GPU or laptop) hardware in research and education settings. In DiY (home cockpit) or professional simulator settings FlightGear is run in complex configurations, like having multiple instances of FlightGear running limited parts of the sim following a master instance, effectively distributing functionality across multiple embedded processors/systems over LAN or internet - e.g. using an ipad/iphone/android device to display instruments/maps , having multiple Raspberry Pis with stripped down builds of FlightGear drive displays/instruments , viewing instruments on any device that can render web pages, running physics/systems/graphics using separate PCs/devices, driving multiple views on different PCs etc.

FlightGear can scale to a huge range of hardware. FlightGear keeps renderers from older eras, has lots of settings configurability, has multiple weather and physics engines with differing requirements, and is backwards compatible with older versions of aircraft.

For marginal systems it's recommended for people to try running latest FG with lower settings, older renderers like shaderless, older terrain (e.g. WS 1.0), older aircraft, or less complex aircraft, before switching to older FlightGear versions. Try turning off world-wide AI traffic as it can be demanding.

At high settings FlightGear 2018 and later can fully use a GTX 1060+ at 1080p (1920 x 1080) resolution.

Your target frame-rates (FPS) should be lower than for reflex based shooter games, as response speeds of aircraft control systems and aircraft turn rates are slower (30-ish FPS for a lot of aircraft and flying activities). Smoothness (maximum frame spacing) is more important, although better FPS helps that. If frame-spacing is smooth, look at higher FPS only after turning up graphics and AA.

See wiki pages for requirements:

• FlightGear Minimum Startup Profile - on marginal systems can use this and turn settings up one by one.
• FlightGear Hardware recommendations
• Performance tips for worldwide 3d buildings, roads, cities (2020.3.7 and later)
• Example screenshots of appearance when using equivalent of GTX 1050 Ti or higher at 1080p, at 25+ FPS, with 4 core i5 or equivalent CPU.
• Aircraft from older versions of FlightGear

FlightGear has been shown working on Steam Deck (July 2022).

Graphics settings are turned off so the sim starts up on non-gaming or older hardware. Renderers from older eras like "Default" or "Rembrandt" are kept around unlike Windows software which keep only the latest technology - e.g FlightGear 2020.3 still supports 3d graphics without shaders at lower settings in the "Default" renderer. Turn on view/rendering and environment settings with menu inside the simulator as well as launcher menu.

The following, taken from the official FlightGear wiki, should be considered a baseline for high-ish settings at 1080p. As stated above, what airplane is being flown, how detailed the underlying simulation, the renderer and detail of rendering, etc. will change these requirements.

Windows

macOS (OS X)

Linux

Windows
	Minimum	Recommended
Operating system (OS)
Processor (CPU)	Intel Core i5-2500	Intel Core i5-4xxx series AMD Ryzen series
System memory (RAM)	8 GB	16 GB
Hard disk drive (HDD)
Video card (GPU)	Nvidia GeForce GTX 960	Nvidia GeForce GTX 1050 Ti

System requirements for high-ish settings at 1080p. FlightGear can run on much lower spec hardware, including with recent integrated GPUs. Max-ish settings need better hardware, GTX 1060+ at 1080p.

macOS (OS X)
	Minimum	Recommended
Operating system (OS)
Processor (CPU)	Intel Core i5-2500	Intel Core i5-4xxx series AMD Ryzen series
System memory (RAM)	8 GB	16 GB
Hard disk drive (HDD)
Video card (GPU)	Nvidia GeForce GTX 960	Nvidia GeForce GTX 1050 Ti

System requirements for high-ish settings. FlightGear can run on much lower spec hardware.

Linux
	Minimum	Recommended
Operating system (OS)
Processor (CPU)	Intel Core i5-2500	Intel Core i5-4xxx series AMD Ryzen series
System memory (RAM)	8 GB	16 GB
Hard disk drive (HDD)
Video card (GPU)	Nvidia GeForce GTX 960	Nvidia GeForce GTX 1050 Ti

System requirements for high-ish settings. FlightGear can run on much lower spec hardware.