How to choose drone fleet management software
Start with the job that takes up your team’s time. If you spend the end of every month collecting logs from several pilots, adding up flight hours and figuring out which battery was used on which aircraft, your first requirement is a reliable flight history. If your team also needs to assign missions, schedule maintenance or monitor aircraft in the air, evaluate each of those workflows separately.
By Flymetry · Reviewed
Give each shortlisted vendor the same task and ask to see the result. Here’s a test you can use.
Start with the files your fleet actually produces
Ask which combinations of aircraft, controller, flight app and log format the vendor has tested. Then ask them to show what their software can read from a file produced by your setup. For a DJI flight, that might mean checking whether you can see flight time, the recorded route and battery data. If the tool can only show a summary, it should make clear which details are missing.
If you use DJI Pilot 2, identify the file you need before comparing import results. DJI’s export documentation distinguishes flight records from flight controller data. The extension is a clue, but it tells you little about which fields a particular tool can extract from that file. Find and export DJI Pilot 2 flight logs · DJI’s export instructions
Use three files to test four things
Choose two different flights in which you can identify the same physical battery, for example by a battery serial number recorded in both logs. Use two aircraft only if both are designed for that battery type. Two flights with the same aircraft also work. Add a byte-for-byte copy of one file, ideally under a different filename. Use records you have permission to share or run the test in an environment you control.
Synthetic example. The records show 14 minutes and 20 seconds and 11 minutes and 40 seconds respectively, both measured from take-off to landing. Battery B‑17 is identified in both flights. The second record has no available temperature value. The third file is a byte-for-byte copy of the first. After excluding the copy, you should have two flights, 26 minutes using the same duration measure and two battery observations. This checks how the tool handles an identical file. If you often receive the same flight in different export formats, test that separately.
| Question | What to ask the vendor to show |
|---|---|
| Does it count the flights correctly? | How the tool flags the identical copy, which duration measure it uses and which records contribute to the total. |
| Can you follow the battery across aircraft? | Which identifier links the observations and how the tool displays uncertain identity. Two flights with the battery give you two observations. Use a separately recorded cycle count when you need charging cycle data. |
| Can you spot missing data? | That the tool leaves temperature blank or labels it as unknown when no value is available. If the tool can tell why, ask it to distinguish a value that was never recorded from one it could not read. |
| Can someone else check the record? | How to get back to the original file, which fields an export includes and what a colleague can see under their own account. |
Compare an exported row with the same flight in the interface. Check the flight date, time zone, duration measure and aircraft identity. That tells you whether the export will work for the reports your team actually prepares. Guide to drone logbooks and flight time
Decide how much of your operation the software needs to cover
Post-flight records help you answer what flew, when and with which equipment. If that is your main need, prioritise reliable imports, searchable history and usable exports.
Maintenance becomes a separate requirement when you need to schedule service, assign responsibility or document a completed inspection. Ask to see the workflow from a service interval through to a recorded action.
Mission planning and live monitoring cover the work before and during a flight. If you need to assign pilots or see an aircraft’s location in real time, test those workflows under the conditions in which your team will use them.
When two tools pass the initial test, compare costs for the number of pilots and aircraft you actually operate. Ask how you would retrieve originals and history if you changed providers. If pilots and administrators will share the system, have one person from each role run through the same task.
Explore the Flymetry workflow
Flymetry focuses on reviewing completed flights. It links imported DJI flight records to registered aircraft and to batteries where the logs provide enough information to identify them. The public demo uses synthetic flights and shows how to move from an aircraft’s history to individual flights and battery observations. Open the fleet demo · See how Flymetry’s fleet history works
Want to try the workflow with your own supported logs? Apply for the Flymetry private beta.