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by ce4 2893 days ago
I beg to disagree. My phones have all gotten a lock on planes so far.
5 comments

The limits are higher altitude and faster speed then you've ever been. If the Concorde was around you would see it firsthand. Weapons would be worthless against first world defences at airliner height and speed. Gps receivers shut down on weather balloons regularly, it's a known issue

The limits are real, encoded in public law. I don't understand how you could possibly disagree with me on this point

Ignore the comment above, obviously ignorance :) Thanks for explaining.
It's okay, I was wrong about what the limits are too. They've been increased a lot
The reason your GPS receiver does not work on a plane is likely because it's processing algorithms aren't tuned for those speeds. The popular Ublox NEO-6M for example needs to be explicitly switched to "airborne" mode.

The fact that you are enclosed in a faraday cage also isn't helping, but they make planes from plastic now, so this shouldn't always be the case.

Planes don’t usually reach the limits, but they exist. The limits seem to be 1200mph or 59000ft altitude.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/CoCom

1200mph and 59000ft altitude
Unfortunately many cheap GPS chips use the (incorrect) or definition, not and. It was a pain to find one that works above 59000ft but very slow speed for a weather balloon project some years ago.
I like using a NSF funded mobile app "Flyover Country" [1] to identify features in the landscape when I fly. You can download the maps and data for you flight path a head of time and then use it in airplane mode on the plane. GPS works fine (by the window) and the app locates your position on the map.

https://flyovercountry.io/

Odd that you'd think that aircraft would be covered by these restrictions considering the fact that they use GPS to navigate.
There's not a ton of civilian craft cruising about at nearly Mach 2.