Garmin Launches New Version of Pilot App

A new version of the Garmin Pilot app for iOS out just in time for the start of the spring and summer flying season adds several new features that pilots should appreciate.

Garmin Pilot Version 9.3 adds weather enhancements, airspace alerting, traffic display and runway extended centerlines, among other enhanced features. A new flight profile view lets users view the probability of severity of icing and overall icing potential, with light green, yellow and red shading indicating the likelihood of icing at given altitudes. Pilots can also view projected paths of storm cells, depicted by an orange circle with a line extending from the strongest cells and showing the predicted location of storms in the next 15, 30, 45, and 60 minutes.

Symbols for hail or tornadic activity, when applicable, are displayed next to the storm cell line. And more information can be gleaned about the cell icon in the app’s radial menu. Another weather enhancement is a surface analysis layer available on the moving map for Garmin GDL 51, 52, or 69 users with a SiriusXM aviation weather subscription.

Improvements to airspace alerting include notifications before the aircraft entering select airspace segments, which can be selected on the settings page. When paired with an ADS-B In receiver, Garmin Pilot allows pinch-to-zoom capability on the traffic page. Traffic can be displayed in relative altitude (relative to own-ship) or absolute altitude (relative to the ground), Garmin says.

Garmin has also added mile marker segments on extended runway centerlines to make it easier to see how far the aircraft is from the runway on final approach.

A standard one-year subscription to Garmin Pilot is $74.99 and the IFR Premium version costs $149.99 a year.