Mission Planner — The Complete Guide: An ArduPilot Ground Station for Mission Planning and Mapping
Mission Planner is open-source ground control software (GPL-3.0 licence) for drones and other vehicles running the ArduPilot autopilot. It is used by surveyors and engineers doing aerial photography and mapping with drones, and by developers of unmanned vehicles.
Mission Planner
ArduPilot (Michael Oborne)
Ground control station for ArduPilot drones and vehicles — map-based mission planning, autopilot setup, telemetry and log analysis.
Get it from the vendorWhat you get
- Map-based mission planning — click waypoints and pick commands from a list.
- Autopilot setup — configuration and calibration.
- In-flight telemetry — tracking the vehicle’s state in real time.
- Log analysis — downloading and reviewing flight logs.
- Built-in simulation — testing a mission without a real vehicle.
What to know
Mission Planner is designed mainly for Windows. On Linux it runs through Mono, with occasional issues. It is meant for vehicles running ArduPilot — if you work with PX4 or want software that also runs on macOS and Android, choose QGroundControl. As with any flight, follow the applicable rules and required permits.
Related tools
For an alternative ground station across operating systems — QGroundControl. For processing the photos into a map and model — WebODM or COLMAP.
QGroundControl
Dronecode Project
Ground control station for PX4 and ArduPilot drones — mission planning, area surveys and corridor scans for photogrammetry and mapping.
Get it from the vendor
WebODM (OpenDroneMap)
OpenDroneMap
Photogrammetry from drone imagery — orthophoto, elevation model, point cloud and textured 3D model.
Get it from the vendor
COLMAP
COLMAP developers (Johannes Schönberger)
Photogrammetry from photos — Structure-from-Motion and Multi-View Stereo to build 3D point clouds and models.
Get it from the vendor
ROS (Robot Operating System)
Open Robotics
The standard middleware for building robot software.
Get it from the vendorThe bottom line
For anyone flying ArduPilot, Mission Planner is a complete, free tool for planning, setup and analysis. Combined with photogrammetry software it is the basis of a full open-source mapping chain.