One API for everything aviation.
Computed active runways, normalized ATIS, runway conditions, navaids, frequencies, and airline reference data — one schema, one key, real-time.
Connecting to the strongest live airport feed…
Airport operations data, not just wind and coordinates
The parts of an aviation API that take real engineering to get right — computed, normalized, and cross-checked, not just piped through from a raw feed.
Computed active runways
We don't just hand back wind data and leave the math to you. Active runway determination compares live wind against runway headings and returns arrival/departure flags with a confidence score.
Normalized ATIS
D-ATIS broadcasts arrive as dense teletype text. We parse them into structured fields — wind, visibility, clouds, active runways, NOTAMs, remarks — while still returning the raw text for anyone who wants it.
Runway surface conditions
Per-runway wet/snow/ice percentages, contamination depth, and remaining-width condition, parsed out of the same ATIS feed most tools throw away after reading the wind line.
Wind with automatic fallback
A single wind endpoint that returns the freshest available observation automatically, without requiring client-side fallback logic.
Terminal geometry
Terminal buildings resolved live for any airport with coordinates on file — no separate terminals database to go stale.
Airline reference data
Fuzzy search by name, alias, ICAO, IATA, or callsign, with active carriers ranked first when a code has been reused over the years.
Navaids & frequencies
VOR, NDB, DME, and TACAN records with frequency, position, and usage type, alongside every radio frequency on file for an airport — tower, ground, ATIS, and more.
Raw and curated weather
Curated, simplified METAR/TAF views for the common case, or the complete unfiltered report — raw text and every parsed field — when you need it.
One schema, every airport
Every endpoint speaks the same JSON, keyed off the same ICAO code.
How we compare
Most major aviation data APIs are flight-tracking-first. Skystack is airport-operations-first.
| Capability | Skystack | FlightAware AeroAPI | AviationStack | Cirium | AeroDataBox |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Computed active runways (confidence-scored) | |||||
| Normalized ATIS (structured fields) Cirium lists NOTAMs and weather among its enterprise data sets, but ATIS isn't broken into structured fields the way Skystack returns it. | |||||
| Runway surface conditions |
Simple, predictable pricing
Full pricing detailsStarter
- 25,000 requests / month
- 10 req/s rate limit
- Email support
- $0.001/req overage
Growth
- 150,000 requests / month
- 25 req/s rate limit
- Priority email support
- $0.0008/req overage
Scale
- 1,000,000 requests / month
- 50 req/s rate limit
- Priority support + SLA
- $0.0005/req overage
From the blog
Read the blog
Data is commodity. Computation is the product.
The raw inputs behind an aviation API are widely available. The differentiation isn't possessing them — it's what you compute on top.
ATIS is messier than METAR — here's how we normalize it
METAR is a stable, well-documented format. ATIS is a controller reading a script into a recording. Here's what it takes to turn one into structured data.
Why we compute active runways instead of just reporting wind
Wind direction and speed are three numbers. Which runways are actually in use is the question developers are really asking — so that's what we answer.
Start building on real airport data
Free tier included. No credit card until you outgrow it.