We're pleased to announce the release of Eagle Eyes Pilot 1.6.0-beta.
(19 minutes, 31 seconds)
In this release:
New Landing Page
You’ll see the landing page for the app is completely overhauled. We’ve designed it to allow the pilot to easily verify that all systems (Drone Battery/Signal, Drone sensors, Controller Battery/Signal, CalTopo, Wifi, etc) are operational before flying.
AirSense
For drones with AirSense, we visually warn the pilot of nearby aircraft broadcasting on ADS-B. Note: not all aircraft broadcast ADS-B, so the pilot must still maintain visual airspace awareness.
New Map Interface
Much better interface for viewing and interacting with map objects.
DJI Health Monitoring/Warnings
We bring all DJI warnings into the app, and bring in a home-screen “health check” for the pilot to verify all subsystems of their drone.
Procedures Checklist
You can now set up your controller with SOPs and checklists for easy pilot reference.
Background Mode
If you’re flying a drone without DJI SDK support (like the Mini 5 for example) or you prefer to fly in the native DJI app, you can turn on “Background mode” - which lets you track to CalTopo and livestream while flying with the native DJI Piloting app instead of Eagle Eyes Pilot. You can find this in “…” → Set Up Controller → Advanced Options.
Custom Buttons
From the piloting view you can go to the menu, settings, button customization - allowing you to configure custom button actions to suit your workflow.
Other improvements/fixes since 1.5.0
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Joining non-team CalTopo maps by QR Code. Previously if you drone-scanned a CalTopo QR code not belonging to your team, you were directed to log in manually. That is now fixed, and you should be able to join the map right away.
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Share your realtime drone location over the internet to other Eagle Eyes Pilot users connected to your CalTopo map. You can turn on “Use CalTopo Map for MQTT” in settings. This is an experimental feature and we may change the way it is implemented in the future, so we have kept it hidden for now. It will be officially released in 1.7. In the meantime, you are welcome to try it and we would like to hear if it is useful to you.
What’s Next
The next month should contain a series of releases.
- We plan to update the "stable" version of Eagle Eyes Pilot to 1.6. Generally our policy going forward will be to upgrade a "beta" release to "stable" after it has been out in the field for a few weeks without major issues.
- We plan to release Eagle Eyes Pilot 1.7 within the next month. This includes some significant new features - so stay tuned for that.
- Our desktop app (Eagle Eyes Scan) is getting a full overhaul - more on that soon.
Feedback or suggestions?
Have feedback or feature ideas for Eagle Eyes? We’re all ears. Contact us at: 📬 info@EagleEyesSearch.com
If you spot a bug or something doesn’t work as expected, please let us know here 🛠️
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21 February 2026, by Eagle Eyes Team