RF propagation · terrain analysis
RF Mapper
You need to know whether a transmitter will actually reach the next ridge — before you drive out there. Online coverage calculators want an account, a connection, and a country code; commercial RF planners want a license you can't justify for a Saturday. RF Mapper is the fix: load a map tile and a DEM, place transmitters, and get a terrain-aware heatmap with line-of-sight, diffraction, and weather loss factored in — entirely on your own machine.
- License
- MIT open-source
- Runtime
- Python 3.11+
- Mode
- Offline DEM + RF propagation
- Price
- $0 free, forever
What it is
The link budget on the ridge, before you drive there.
A desktop application that loads imagery and a digital elevation model, runs terrain-aware RF propagation across a grid of receivers, and produces a heatmap plus exportable geospatial products. Tkinter GUI for interactive work, a CLI batch runner for automation. The propagation model combines free-space, vegetation, water, knife-edge diffraction, Fresnel-zone, and weather loss — aggregated across one or many transmitters — and everything runs on your machine.
01
Terrain-aware propagation
Free-space path loss alone gives you a circle. RF Mapper layers vegetation, water-body, knife-edge diffraction, Fresnel-zone, and weather loss on top, then aggregates the result across multiple transmitters so the heatmap actually matches what the terrain does.
02
GeoTIFF + GeoJSON export
Outputs are PNG overlays, GeoTIFF-style coverage rasters, SVG, GeoJSON site files, and JSON metadata sidecars — ready to open in QGIS, drop into a report, or feed back into another tool. The schema is documented, not implied.
03
Offline and reproducible
No service account, no API tokens, no telemetry. The propagation pass is deterministic for the same inputs, so a colleague running the same DEM and the same transmitter config gets the same heatmap. Field-friendly: works on a laptop with no signal.
How it works
Imagery in, coverage map out.
An interactive GUI for site work, a CLI batch runner for everything you want to script.
Load
Imagery and DEM
Drop in a base image and a DEM tile (GeoTIFF). Optional MiDaS ONNX depth inference fills in terrain depth where a DEM is missing. WhiteboxTools and ITU-R model integrations are available for deeper terrain work.
Compute
Propagation and line-of-sight
Place transmitters, set frequency and power, pick the loss layers that apply. RF Mapper sweeps the grid, checks line-of-sight against the elevation model, evaluates Fresnel-zone clearance, and renders the resulting coverage heatmap.
Export
PNG, GeoTIFF, SVG, GeoJSON
Save the overlay as PNG for a report, the raster as GeoTIFF for QGIS, the site list as GeoJSON for the next tool. The CLI batch runner does the same thing headlessly — one command per DEM, one folder per output run.
Who it's for
If this sounds like you, it will fit.
- You are an RF engineer in the field who needs a sanity check on a link or a site without booting up a desktop-bound commercial planner.
- You are a systems integrator running a site survey — you want a quick terrain-aware coverage map you can hand a customer the same afternoon.
- You are a hobbyist planning an antenna placement — ham radio, LoRa, point-to-point Wi-Fi — and you want a real terrain answer, not a circle on Google Maps.
Plainly
What it does, and what it doesn't.
What it does
- Loads imagery and DEM tiles into an interactive desktop GUI
- Models free-space, vegetation, water, diffraction, Fresnel, and weather loss
- Aggregates coverage across multiple transmitters in one pass
- Runs line-of-sight checks against the elevation model
- Exports PNG overlays, GeoTIFF rasters, SVG, GeoJSON, and metadata sidecars
- Ships a CLI batch runner for headless and scripted runs
- Has a `lite` runtime mode for constrained or headless environments
What it doesn't
- It does not claim regulatory-grade accuracy — it is a planning and sanity-check tool, not a certified link-budget instrument
- It is not a network analyzer — it models propagation, it does not measure live signals
- It is not an online service — there is no hosted dashboard, no account, no cloud sync
- It does not fetch DEMs for you — bring your own GeoTIFF
- It is not a replacement for an on-site spectrum sweep when one is required
It's free and open-source. Clone it.
RF Mapper is MIT-licensed — no tiers, no account, no paid version held back. Clone the repo, install the package, and launch the GUI or the CLI batch runner.