Starting a flight

1. Select Fly from the start menu.
2. Click an airport on the map to choose your departure airport.
3. Click a second airport to choose your arrival airport.
4. Review the plotted route and the preflight distance, estimated duration, and ETA.
5. Select Start flight to begin the simulation.

Routes use long-distance world paths and, when runway data is available, include runway-aware departure and arrival segments. The shuffle button creates a random route; the reset button clears the current flight plan.

During a flight

The compact flight panel shows the route and completion percentage. The heads-up display shows distance remaining, ETA, altitude, speed, heading, and fuel. Use the × button above the flight panel to end the current flight and return to route planning.

Enable Follow plane in Settings to keep the active aircraft centred on the map. Enable Continuous flying to automatically select and launch a new route after arrival.

Radar mode

Select Radar from the start menu to view simulated global air traffic. Click an aircraft to inspect its callsign, route, departure and arrival airports, altitude, speed, and route progress. Use the crosshair button to follow the selected aircraft, or the × button in the Radar panel to deselect it.

Settings

Open Settings with the menu button in the lower-right corner. Horizons remembers these choices in your browser:

• Theme: choose dark or light mode.
• Map elements: choose blue, gray, white, or yellow map styling in Fly mode.
• Real-time flight: fly at the route's real-world duration. Turn it off for a faster simulation.
• Max speed: set the cruise-speed limit from 120 to 1,000 knots.
• Distance units: display distances in kilometres, miles, or nautical miles.
• Airports: show major airports only, or the full available airport set.

Select Return to menu from Settings whenever you want to switch between Fly and Radar modes.

Notes

Airport and runway data are included with Horizons. Map imagery is loaded online, so an internet connection is required for the basemap. If the full airport data cannot be loaded, Horizons uses its included fallback airport set.

v1

• Interactive Leaflet world map with airport markers and selectable departure and arrival airports.
• Flight planning between airports using calculated long-distance routes with curved, world-wrapping map paths.
• Animated aircraft flights with route progress, distance remaining, ETA, altitude, speed, heading, and fuel readouts.
• Preflight distance, duration, and ETA estimates.
• Random flight generation.
• Continuous flying mode for automatically chaining flights.
• Radar mode with a simulated global traffic network.
• Selectable radar aircraft with route details, altitude, speed, and progress information.
• Radar aircraft follow mode to keep a selected aircraft centered on the map.
• Bundled aircraft sprites for radar traffic.
• Dark and light themes.
• Blue, gray, white, and yellow map-element color palettes.
• Configurable maximum cruise speed from 120 to 1,000 knots.
• Kilometres, miles, and nautical-mile distance units.
• Major-airport and all-airport display filters.
• Settings menu with persistent browser preferences.
• Responsive layout for smaller screens and touch devices.
• Splash screen and start menu for choosing Fly or Radar mode.
• Horizons branding, logo assets, favicon, and bundled static resources.
• Bundled airport and runway CSV data for offline data loading.
• Reduced airport and runway datasets to keep the client-side application manageable while retaining useful coverage.
• Bundled Leaflet assets and Font Awesome assets, removing the need for a package manager or build step.
• Bundled radar sprite assets.
• Added a fallback set of major airports for cases where the full airport dataset cannot be loaded.
• Added route-aware runway selection and smoother route geometry.
• Added map-element styling that adapts to the selected theme and palette.
• Improved flight controls, reset behavior, panel states, and in-flight HUD presentation.
• Added airport marker highlighting for departure and arrival selections.
• Added persistent settings for theme, map palette, units, cruise speed, airport filter, real-time mode, follow-plane mode, and continuous flying.
• Updated the project name and user-facing references to Horizons.
• Added settings-menu footer and return-to-start-menu navigation.
• Added minor UI, mobile responsiveness, and stability improvements throughout the first release.

Version Overview