A quick guide to every tab. Jump to a section:

Account & Sign In

The first time you visit wavewatch.online, you'll see a splash screen (tap it to skip), then a choice between New User, Existing User, and Browse Without an Account.

• New User — pick a username, an optional email, and a password (8+ characters). This creates your account.
• Existing User — sign in with your username and password.

Once signed in, your browser remembers you — you won't have to log in again on that device until you tap Sign out (top-right) or clear your browser's data.

Browse Without an Account

Just want to check whether two places can hear each other, without creating an account? Tap Browse Without an Account on the splash screen instead of signing in.

• Nothing is saved to the server and no login is required — this mode uses just your browser. Your two locations are kept only on your device (in your browser's local storage) so they're still there if you come back later, until you tap Reset or clear your browser's data.
• In place of Destination and Profile, you get one Locations tab with two simple entries — Location A and Location B. For each, enter a City, State/Region, Power Output, Antenna Type, Antenna Height, and Elevation. No callsign or grid square typing needed — tap Check Propagation Path and the city/state is looked up and converted to a grid square automatically.
• Reset clears both locations and starts over.
• The Map and Bands tabs work exactly the same as in a signed-in account, just driven by Location A/B instead of a saved Profile/Destination.
• The AI Assistant tab isn't available in this mode — it requires an account.
• You can tap Exit (top-right) at any time to return to the sign-in screen.

Profile

This is your station's info — it drives every prediction in the app, so it's worth filling in accurately. If it's incomplete, you'll land here automatically with a purple "Welcome" banner.

• Name / Email — optional, for your own reference.
• Address fields + "Find Grid Square From Address" — type your street/city/state/ZIP and tap the button to auto-fill your Maidenhead grid square. This uses OpenStreetMap's address lookup service.
• Callsign — if you don't hold a license, enter SWL (short-wave listener).
• Grid Square — required. Auto-filled from your address, or type it directly (4 or 6 characters, e.g. DM26 or DM26ss).
• Rig / Antenna / Power / Ground — the more accurate these are, the more realistic the band predictions (antenna gain, height, and transmit power all factor into the signal estimate).

Tap Save Changes when done. The first time you complete this, you're dropped straight into the Map tab.

Map

Shows your station (purple dot) with four dashed coverage rings — Local, Regional, Continental, and DX — sized at fixed distances (300 / 1000 / 3000 / 8000 km) from your grid square.

If you have an active Destination saved (see below), a blue marker and a dashed path line appear too, along with a Path Info card showing distance, azimuth (compass bearing), best band, and reliability for that specific path.

Solar

Live solar indices pulled from hamqsl.com every 5 minutes:

• SFI (Solar Flux Index) — higher generally means better high-band conditions.
• A-Index / K-Index — geomagnetic activity; higher values mean more disturbance and worse conditions, especially on higher bands.
• X-Ray Flux — solar flare intensity.
• Sunspot Number and Geomag Field — additional solar-weather context.

Below that, a quick-glance "Propagation Conditions" summary for low (80–40m), mid (20–15m), and high (10–6m) band groups.

Bands

A full table of all 8 HF bands (80m–10m) with a condition badge (Excellent/Fair/Poor), a reliability percentage bar, and each band's generally best UTC time window. If you have an active Destination set, this table reflects that specific path — otherwise it's a local/general assessment from your station.

Time Explorer — the slider at the bottom lets you preview conditions 0–24 hours into the future. Drag it to experiment: the whole table, the gray line info, and MUF/LUF all recalculate for that hour, so you can find the best band for a specific future time. The label shows both your local time and UTC. Tap Reset to now to jump back to the present.

Gray Line — shows when the next sunrise/sunset transition will enhance propagation along your path, which is when this effect is strongest.

Destination

Save one or more remote stations you want to predict propagation toward.

• Pick + New Destination from the dropdown, fill in a Destination Name (just a label for your own reference, like "Chris's cabin"), a callsign, and a grid square, then tap Save Destination.
• Look Up Grid From Callsign — enter the contact's callsign and tap this button to auto-fill their grid square via HamDB.org's free callbook. Works best for US callsigns; if no grid is on file, enter it manually.
• Don't know the callsign (e.g. an SWL contact)? Put SWL in the Callsign field, and instead include the city/state right in the Destination Name, e.g. "Bill in Los Angeles, California" or "Fred Dash - London, England". Then tap Find Grid Square From Destination Name to geocode it — no extra fields needed.
• Saving again under the same name updates that destination. Saving under a new name adds another one to your list.
• Use the dropdown to switch which saved destination is active — that's the one used on the Map and Bands tabs.
• Delete This Destination removes whichever one is currently loaded.

AI Assistant

Ask plain-English questions about conditions, bands, or your destination path — it has your live solar data and profile loaded as context. Try the suggestion chips to get started, or type your own question.

Admin Console

Administrators can visit wavewatch.online/admin to see every registered user, a total user count, and each person's station profile. From there you can promote/demote admins, reset a user's password, or delete an account. This page is separate from the main app and isn't linked publicly.