What Plane Is Flying Over Me? Live Map for the United States

The map above shows aircraft over the United States that are transmitting their position by ADS-B transponder, picked up by a network of ground receivers. It refreshes every few seconds. Tap the green Above me button and your browser will ask once for your location. The map then centers on you, marked with a blue dot, and a list of the five nearest aircraft appears under the map with callsign, type, distance, direction and altitude. Your location is used only in your browser to center the map and work out distances. It is not stored and not sent to our server or to anyone else.

If you would rather not share your location, type your town or city into the search box on the map. The map jumps there and shows the same list of the five nearest aircraft. Click any plane on the map, or in the list, to open its details.

What flew over earlier?

Did you see or hear a low-flying aircraft or helicopter earlier and want to know which one it was? Choose a place or your own location, a day and an hour, and a radius of 2, 5 or 10 km, and you will see which aircraft passed over within that radius at the time, with time, flight, aircraft, altitude and distance. You can look back as far as 17 August 2026, based on data from the FlyItalyADSB receiver network.

Why there is so much traffic over the United States

If you live almost anywhere in the lower 48 states, planes pass overhead all day. The FAA handles more than 44,000 flights a day, carrying over 3 million airline passengers, and at peak times about 5,500 aircraft are in the air at once. Add more than 166,000 general aviation airplanes and over 10,000 helicopters, and the sky is rarely empty.

Much of this traffic is funneled through a handful of hubs. Hartsfield-Jackson in Atlanta has been the world’s busiest airport by passengers almost every year since 1998 and handled close to 800,000 aircraft movements in 2024. Dallas Fort Worth and Denver follow with roughly 743,000 and 695,000 movements. Flights between the coasts cross the central states at cruising altitude, so even a quiet town in Kansas sees a steady stream of contrails, which is why the map starts centered on the middle of the country. Zoom in on your area or tap Above me to see what is directly over you.

Approach paths over the suburbs

The planes you notice most are the low ones, and those are arriving or departing. Airliners on final approach follow a descent path of about 3 degrees, roughly 300 feet (about 90 m) of height per nautical mile from the runway. So a jet 3 miles from touchdown is around 900 feet (about 270 m) up, at 7 miles near 2,100 feet (about 600 m), and at 12 miles about 3,600 feet (about 1,100 m). Around a large hub, that final stretch runs for miles over houses and schools, which is why some suburbs hear a plane every couple of minutes when the wind favors a particular runway.

On the map, arrivals line up in a row, all heading the same way and descending step by step. Click one and you will see its altitude and speed falling as it nears the airport. Aircraft at cruise are usually between 30,000 and 40,000 feet (about 9,100 to 12,200 m), and you mostly see those as a tiny dot or a contrail.

How to read the list under the map

After you tap Above me, the list shows the five aircraft nearest to you. Distance is how far away the plane is horizontally, direction tells you where to look, and altitude helps you judge whether it is the one you saw. A plane 2 miles away at 3,000 feet (about 900 m) is big and loud; at 36,000 feet (about 11,000 m) it is a speck. Click an entry for the callsign, registration, type, altitude, speed and heading, plus the route and flight times when known, often with a photo.

Why most planes in the US are visible on the map

Since January 1, 2020, the FAA has required ADS-B Out equipment for flight in most controlled airspace: Class A, B and C airspace, Class E airspace at or above 10,000 feet (about 3,000 m), and the area within 30 nautical miles of a major Class B airport. In practice, nearly every airliner, business jet and most small aircraft near big cities broadcast their position, altitude and identity, and that is the signal the receiver network feeds to this map.

Why not every aircraft shows up

There are still gaps, and it is better to know about them than to wonder why the plane you just saw is missing. The main reasons:

• No working transponder. Aircraft outside the rule airspace, such as a small plane over rural land below 10,000 feet (about 3,000 m), do not have to carry ADS-B Out, and some do not.
• Military and government flights. Some of these do not broadcast, or are not shown.
• LADD requests. Owners of private aircraft can ask the FAA to limit how their aircraft data is displayed under the Limiting Aircraft Data Displayed program, which replaced the older BARR program. Those planes may not appear, or may appear without identification.
• Receiver coverage. ADS-B signals travel by line of sight. High-flying jets are heard from far away, but a helicopter or small plane at a few hundred feet is easily hidden behind terrain or buildings, and areas with few receivers have thinner coverage.

So if the list does not show the low aircraft you heard, it was most likely out of range of a receiver.

Tips for finding the plane you just saw

Act quickly, because a fast jet soon drops down the list. Compare direction first, then altitude. If you saw a plane low over the rooftops, look for an entry under about 5,000 feet (about 1,500 m) heading toward or away from the nearest airport. If you saw a contrail, look for the highest entries. A slow light with a flashing beacon at night is often a helicopter or small plane, the kind most likely to be outside receiver coverage.

Frequently asked questions

How do I find out what plane just flew over my house?

Open the map on this page and tap the green Above me button. Your browser asks for your location, the map centers on you, and a list of the five nearest aircraft appears with callsign, type, distance, direction and altitude. Click the one that matches to see registration, speed, heading and, when known, where it is flying from and to. If you do not want to share your location, type your town into the search box instead.

Why can’t I see the plane that is flying over me right now?

The most common reason is that the aircraft is low and out of range of the nearest receiver, since ADS-B signals travel by line of sight. Other reasons are that it has no ADS-B transponder, which is allowed outside controlled airspace, that it is a military or government flight, or that the owner has asked the FAA to limit display of the aircraft through the LADD program.

How high are the planes flying over me?

It depends on where you live. Airliners at cruise are usually between 30,000 and 40,000 feet (about 9,100 to 12,200 m) and appear as small dots or contrails. Near an airport, arriving aircraft descend at about 300 feet (about 90 m) per mile, so a jet 5 miles from the runway is around 1,500 feet (about 500 m) up. The list under the map shows the current altitude of each nearby aircraft so you can tell which is which.

For the full picture of traffic over the whole country, open our live flight radar, and if the aircraft you heard was hovering or moving slowly at low altitude, try the helicopter tracker for the USA.