Introducing the Sondex Public Beta

We’re thrilled to announce that Sondex is officially entering public beta. After months of development, testing, and a complete UI overhaul, we’re ready to put professional-grade sounding analysis tools in the hands of meteorologists, storm chasers, weather enthusiasts, and anyone curious about what’s happening in the atmosphere above them.

This is a significant milestone for us, and we want you to be part of shaping what Sondex becomes.

What is Sondex?

Sondex brings professional atmospheric sounding analysis to Apple devices. Whether you’re a forecaster preparing for a severe weather outbreak, a student learning thermodynamics, or an enthusiast who wants to dig deeper than surface observations, Sondex gives you the tools to explore the vertical structure of the atmosphere in ways that were previously limited to desktop software or clunky web interfaces.

Built natively for iPhone and iPad (with Mac coming soon), Sondex takes full advantage of Apple’s platform—intuitive touch interactions, smooth animations, and a design language that feels right at home on your device.

What You Get in the Public Beta

Interactive Skew-T / Log-P Diagrams

The Skew-T is the cornerstone of sounding analysis, and we’ve built ours from the ground up to be both accurate and delightful to use. Explore temperature and dewpoint profiles with full interactivity—pinch to zoom into specific layers, tap anywhere on the diagram to get exact values at any pressure level. The rendering logic has been significantly updated in this build for higher accuracy and smoother performance, even on complex soundings.

Hodographs

Visualize wind shear and helicity with our interactive hodograph display. Storm-relative vectors are calculated automatically, with left and right mover storm motion options. Understanding the wind profile has never been more intuitive.

Comprehensive Sounding Indices

All the parameters you need are available at a glance: CAPE, CIN, Lifted Index, K-Index, Total Totals, Showalter Index, and more. Each index features color-coded severity levels so you can quickly assess atmospheric instability and severe weather potential without hunting through numbers.

Time-Height Sections

Go beyond a single snapshot in time. Our contoured cross-sections show how temperature, dewpoint, humidity, and winds evolve through forecast hours, giving you a complete picture of how conditions will change.

Station Map

Find nearby ASOS and NWS stations on an interactive map. The public beta includes one free auto-fetch station, allowing you to automatically pull the latest data from your favorite location.

BUFKIT File Import

Already have BUFKIT files from other sources? Import them directly from the Files app, email attachments, or Safari downloads. The public beta includes five free imports to get you started.

All Major Forecast Models

Sondex connects directly to BUFKIT data sources, giving you access to the latest model runs from NCEP. GFS, HRRR, NAM, NAM 4K—select your station and download the data you need with a single tap.

The Complete UI Overhaul

This public beta represents a major visual and functional redesign of the entire application. If you’ve been following our TestFlight builds, you’ve seen pieces of this come together. Now it’s ready for a wider audience.

Charts & Visualization

The charts interface has been completely reimagined. New overlay controls give you finer control over what’s displayed, and the new ChartToggleRow makes managing multiple data layers simple. We’ve introduced a dedicated ChartControlBar that unifies all chart interactions in one consistent location.

Library & Dashboard

Your Dashboard now puts statistics and data visibility front and center. We’ve added a brand new Model Comparison feature that lets you view different model solutions side by side directly within the library. Archive views have been redesigned to match our new visual language, and file history tracking helps you keep tabs on your imported data.

The new InfiniteSlider brings fluid, intuitive control to timeline navigation. The action bar and timeline sliders have been modernized throughout. Under the hood, a new global action bus ensures that tab bar interactions are handled reliably no matter where you are in the app.

Maps & Details

The StationRunDetailsView has been completely rebuilt for improved information density without sacrificing clarity. Map components have been refactored for better performance, and we’ve enhanced analytics actions throughout.

Smoother Transitions

Navigation logic has been refactored across the board. Moving between the Dashboard, Library, and Map views should feel seamless. We’ve touched nearly every UI component in the app to ensure visual consistency from screen to screen.

Platform Availability

The public beta is available now for iPhone and iPad.

A Mac public beta is coming soon. We’re putting the finishing touches on the desktop experience and want to make sure it meets the same standard of quality before opening it up.

What We Need From You

This is a beta, and betas exist for a reason. We need your help finding the rough edges.

Try to break it. Seriously. We want you to push Sondex to its limits. Load complex soundings. Rapidly switch between views. Import unusual BUFKIT files. Zoom in and out aggressively on charts. Navigate back and forth between screens faster than any reasonable person would. If something crashes, freezes, looks wrong, or just feels off, we want to know about it.

Here are some specific areas we’d love feedback on:

Charts and Rendering — Do the Skew-T diagrams render correctly across different soundings? Are the hodographs accurate? Do the overlays behave as expected? Is performance smooth even with dense data?

Navigation and Transitions — Move between the Dashboard, Library, Archive, and Map views. Do transitions feel smooth? Are there any visual glitches when switching screens? Does the app ever get into a weird state?

Data Import and Fetching — Try importing BUFKIT files from different sources. Download data from various stations and models. Does everything load correctly? Are there edge cases where parsing fails?

General Usability — Is the interface intuitive? Can you find what you’re looking for? Are there interactions that feel awkward or confusing? We’ve made a lot of design decisions and we want to know if they’re working for real users.

Device Variety — If you have access to multiple devices, try Sondex on different iPhone and iPad models. Screen sizes and performance characteristics vary, and we want to ensure a great experience across the board.

How to Report Issues

When you encounter a bug or have feedback, the more detail you can provide, the better. Let us know what you were doing when the issue occurred, what you expected to happen, and what actually happened. Screenshots and screen recordings are incredibly helpful. If the app crashed, any information you can share about what led up to it will help us track down the problem.

Thank You

Building Sondex has been a labor of love. Atmospheric sounding analysis is a niche but essential tool for understanding weather, and we believe it deserves a modern, well-crafted application on the devices people actually use every day.

By joining the public beta, you’re helping us build something better. Every bug report, every piece of feedback, every suggestion makes Sondex more useful for the entire community.

We can’t wait to see what you discover in the atmosphere.

Download the Sondex Public Beta

Available now for iPhone and iPad. Mac coming soon.

Unlock the secrets of the atmosphere.