CicadaTAK

A TAK App for CicadaTak Radios

$2.99 · Designed for iPad. Not verified for macOS.

CicadaTAK turns your phone into a live tactical display for places with no cell service and no internet — backcountry, disaster response, large properties, search grids, event perimeters. It is the companion app for CicadaTAK mesh nodes: 900 MHz radio gateways you build yourself from a fully documented hardware recipe (parts list and instructions at cicadatak.com). Nodes form a self-healing mesh that reaches over a mile per hop and relays through every teammate, so coverage grows as the team spreads out. Your phone joins a node's WiFi and the radios do the rest. WORKS WITH ATAK AND iTAK • Nodes speak Cursor-on-Target in both directions — positions, chat and markers pass between this app and ATAK or iTAK devices on the same node • No TAK server, no data plan, no setup beyond joining the node's WiFi • Run this app, run ATAK, or run both side by side on one team LIVE TEAM MAP • Teammates update live with callsigns, colors and breadcrumb trails • A position that stops being current turns grey and shows its age instead of vanishing, so you always know how old the picture is • Offline maps — download aerial, topo and street layers onto the node and use them with zero internet • Drop markers, draw geofence zones, measure distance and bearing, save routes ENCRYPTED TEAM CHAT • End-to-end encrypted with your team passphrase — the key never leaves your team • Share photos from camera or gallery, carried over the radio, never through a server • Delivery receipts, canned quick replies, and roll call for fast accountability PUSH-TO-TALK VOICE • Live streaming PTT to the whole team — real voice traffic, not recorded clips • Tuned to stay intelligible on marginal links LONG-RANGE LoRa BRIDGE • Nodes fitted with LoRa hardware bridge to Meshtastic radios, carrying positions and text far beyond the main mesh • Three privacy modes, from open interoperability to fully dark RUN THE NETWORK FROM YOUR POCKET • Set up a new node from the app — no laptop, no terminal • Live topology graph of every radio link, colored by measured throughput • Node list with signal, battery and hardware status; one-tap ping for round-trip time • Trade speed for range across the whole team at once, with automatic revert if a node doesn't come back • Update node firmware over the air YOUR DATA STAYS YOURS • No accounts, no sign-up, no cloud, no analytics • Everything travels phone to your own radio to your teammates' phones • There is no server in the path, so there is nothing for us to see IMPORTANT • Full functionality requires CicadaTAK node hardware. Without a node the app runs in Standalone Mode: your own GPS on the map, offline map browsing, and every screen navigable — mesh chat, PTT and team positions activate when you connect to a node. • Nodes operate in the 902–928 MHz license-free ISM band on the United States channel plan, which is also licence-exempt in Canada,Mexico, and Australia. No radio license required. • Build your nodes at cicadatak.com — an open, fully documented hardware build on an open-source radio and mesh foundation.

  • 5.0
    out of 5
    1 Ratings

• Update your nodes to firmware 0.22.0 first. • Markers travel over LoRa with their colour and icon, can be dragged to move, and expire after 24 h — or pick 1 h to Never. • Bring a friend's Meshtastic radio onto your team from the LoRa page, and pick your node's own radio. • Node problems now show in plain words with how to fix them, including a one-tap 2.4 GHz restart. • Fixed: map dots vanishing, a black map after Bluetooth pairing, and follow mode fighting your fingers.

The developer, Merbella Studios Inc, indicated that the app’s privacy practices may include handling of data as described below. For more information, see the developer’s privacy policy .

  • Data Not Collected

    The developer does not collect any data from this app.

    Privacy practices may vary, for example, based on the features you use or your age. Learn More

    The developer has not yet indicated which accessibility features this app supports. Learn More

    Seller
    Merbella Studios Inc.
    Size
    30.7 MB
    Category
    Utilities
    Compatibility
    Requires iOS 15.1 or later.
    • iPhone
      Requires iOS 15.1 or later.
    • iPad
      Requires iPadOS 15.1 or later.
    • iPod touch
      Requires iOS 15.1 or later.
    • Mac
      Requires macOS 15.1 or later and a Mac with Apple M1 chip or later.
    • Apple Vision
      Requires visionOS 1.0 or later.
    Languages
    English
    Age Rating
    4+
    Copyright
    © CicadaX LLC 2026