How the Omniris phone app, for iPhone and Android, puts your vault, your jobs, your findings and your construction progress in your pocket on site, and keeps working when the signal drops.
Field work happens where the office isn't: on a roof, in a field, on a half-built site with one bar of signal. The Omniris phone app is the part of Omniris you take there. It signs in with the same account as the website, opens the same vault, and sends what you do on site straight into the same records everyone else works from.
It is built around a pilot's day, from the weather forecast to the pre-flight checklist to the last photo, and it is just as useful to anyone else on site: a supervisor recording progress, an inspector filing a defect, a reviewer checking AI results on the train home.
Google, Apple, Microsoft, Facebook, a passkey, an emailed code or a password: the phone offers the sign-in options your Omniris service offers.
Browse folders, open photos, maps, PDFs and 3D models, and copy, move or delete files, from the phone.
Start a map stitch, a 3D splat, a 3D model or an AI detection run on a folder, with the same checks and prices as the website.
File a defect with a photo and the phone's location, work on findings assigned to you, and see them on a map near you.
Pick an object on the site map and say how much of it is built, with photos and a voice note. Works with no signal.
What you do offline is saved on the phone first and sent when signal returns. If someone else changed the same thing meanwhile, you see both versions and choose.
The sign-in screen looks like the website's. It asks your Omniris service which sign-in options it offers and shows exactly those, so you sign in on the phone the same way you do on the web. An option switched off on your Omniris service is hidden on the phone too.
| Sign in with | How it works on the phone |
|---|---|
| Google, Apple, Microsoft or Facebook | One tap takes you straight to that provider's own sign-in page, then back to the app. |
| A passkey | A passkey is a sign-in key stored on your phone, unlocked with your face, fingerprint or a security key. The app opens a secure browser sheet, you confirm, and you are signed in. No password to type. |
| An emailed code | Type your email address and the app sends a 6-digit code. It expires in 10 minutes and can be sent again after 30 seconds. A new email address gets a new account. If you first signed up with Google, Apple, Microsoft or Facebook, use that button instead: no code is sent to such an address. |
| Email and password | Shown where your Omniris service offers it, with "Forgot password?" sending a reset link to your email. |
The app has six tabs along the bottom: Home, Jobs, Files, Findings, Messages and Account. The Findings tab carries a red count of the open findings assigned to you, the same number the website shows.
Home is your dashboard for the day, greeting you by name and showing only what needs you. Pull down to refresh it. A pilot sees every card below; a client sees the cards that apply to clients (the pilot-only setup, job counts and drones are left out); a viewer sees site progress, uploads and running tasks. From top to bottom, for a pilot:
| Card | What it shows |
|---|---|
| Site Progress | The way in to recording construction progress. Always there, even with no signal. |
| Setup reminder | Only while your pilot setup is unfinished: which of your address, drone, certification and insurance are still missing, or that your application is being reviewed. |
| Upload status | Only while something is happening: "Uploading N files" (blue), "N files waiting to upload" (orange) or "N uploads failed · tap to fix" (red), where you can retry or clear them. |
| Flyability Forecast | A 14-day fly / no-fly strip for your location. Tap a day for the full breakdown (see Before and during a flight). |
| Upcoming Flights | A month calendar marking your planned flight days, and a list of every upcoming flight, including assigned ones whose date is not set yet. Tap one to open its job. |
| Jobs | How many jobs are Available, Applied, Open and Completed. Tap a number to jump to that list. |
| Processing cards | Running Stitching, Splat, 3D Model, AI Detection and Panorama jobs, each with its stage and a progress bar. Tap one for its full status. |
| Background tasks | Large copies, moves and deletes in your vault, with how many files are done. |
| Messages | How many unread messages you have. |
| Quick Actions | Start a job on a folder (below). |
| My Drones | Your registered drones, or a prompt to add your first one. |
| Recent Folders | The five folders you worked in last, one tap to open. |
| Plan & Credits | Your plan, your credit balance and how much of your storage is used. |
Five buttons; the four that start a job show how many credits you have left:
Stitch, Detect, Splat and Create open a folder picker first; you choose the folder and the matching start screen opens. They are described in Starting jobs from the phone.
The Files tab is your Omniris vault, the secure store that holds every photo, map and model, laid out the way you see it on the website. Folders show their names, never storage codes, with a breadcrumb trail to jump back up. Photos show real thumbnails, with each file's size and date.
Under each file are the same detail panels as the website: tags, location and coordinates, the weather at capture, camera and drone settings, file information, the AI detections, and the file's chain of custody (its full history of who uploaded, viewed, moved or shared it). You can favorite a file and add text or voice notes to it.
Tap Manage to select files and folders, even across different folders, then copy, move or delete them. Deleted items go to the Recycle Bin and can be restored for 30 days. Large copies, moves and deletes run on the server and show their progress on the Home screen.
Photos reach the vault from the phone in several ways: taken with the app's camera on a job, imported from a drone's memory card, attached to a finding or a progress entry, or added to a message. Job photos go straight into the job's delivery folder, the folder the client chose for the job.
The upload status on the Home screen shows what is happening: "Uploading N files", "N files waiting to upload" or the red failed count. It disappears when everything is done.
You can start processing on a folder without waiting to get back to a desk. Pick the folder, check the settings, and the job runs on Omniris, not on the phone: you can close the app and it carries on. Each start screen is the phone version of the website's dialog, with the same defaults, the same checks and the same price, shown against your credit balance before you start.
Before you spend credits, the phone runs the same data-quality check as the website: "Checking image overlap and GPS connectivity…". It looks for problems that would make a poor or failed map, such as photos that do not overlap enough to be joined. Its findings are listed as information, warnings or blocks.
If the check finds a blocking problem, Start stays switched off and the screen says why, in plain words. There is no "start anyway" on the phone, just as there is none on the website, and the server refuses such a job whichever way it is sent. The most common block is a flight shot at an angle instead of looking straight down (off nadir). The screen then says, for example: "This flight can't be stitched into a map — it was shot 38° off nadir. Choose Ground (3D model) instead." When that is the only problem, a Build a 3D model instead button switches to Ground mode, where angled photos are exactly what is wanted.
Start is also held while another stitch of the same folder is still running, and while your credits are short (the screen shows what is needed and what you have). If the check itself cannot finish, it says so and never blocks you.
The splat screen sets how long the splat trains, from Quick to Extreme, and at what image resolution, with the price changing as you choose. It runs its own data-quality check on the photos before you start and lists the ones it flags, so you can leave them out.
The 3D model screen builds a textured 3D model directly from the folder's photos, with surface and terrain height maps and contour lines for measuring volumes; no splat is trained. You choose Preview, Standard or High quality, each with its price, how bare ground is found, and the contour spacing, 1.6 ft (0.5 m) by default; the app asks for the spacing in metres. A site and customer name are optional. When the folder has sub-folders, the screen includes their photos, with Include subdirectories ticked, and you can untick that. If too few photos carry GPS for a measurable model, the screen says so instead of offering it. It runs the same data-quality check as the website, scored for a 3D model, and lists the photos it flags so you can leave them out. If the folder already has a 3D model, you choose to back it up first or replace it; if a legal hold or retention policy protects it, it is kept and the new model goes to a fresh folder. If its point cloud has classification edits that were saved but not applied, the screen says so before replacing it.
When a splat finishes, its status screen offers Create 3D Model: a textured 3D model plus measurement products (surface and terrain height maps, contour lines and volumes), built from the splat's existing work, so nothing is processed twice. You choose Preview, Standard or High quality, how bare ground is found, and the contour spacing, 1.6 ft (0.5 m) by default; the app asks for the spacing in metres. A finished 3D model, in turn, offers Create Splat, at Draft, Standard or High quality.
Choose the AI model, type what to look for (it starts with "building. person. car. truck. van. bus. tree."), and choose whether to include sub-folders. Photos that a person has already checked and marked verified are skipped, and not charged for, unless you tick Include verified images; the screen says how many were skipped.
Every running job appears on the Home screen with its stage and a progress bar. Tapping it opens its full status, which updates every few seconds while it runs. From there you can cancel or retry it, open its results folder or its 3D or 360° view, read its log stage by stage (and download it), and, for a stitch, open its survey report or save it as a PDF.
A finding is something on a site that needs attention, such as a crack, a missing tile or a hot spot, recorded with its evidence and its location and tracked until it is dealt with. The Findings tab brings them into the field. (The companion paper Findings you can act on covers them in full.)
On a job, a Finding button on the job's page starts a finding in the job's delivery folder. In the photo viewer, any AI detection can be turned into a finding with one tap (Promote).
A finding's screen shows its reference number, title, stage, severity and category; its evidence images, full screen with pinch zoom; its measured values, in feet and °F first; its location, with how precise it is, its elevation and its folder; and its history with comments. Navigate opens your phone's maps app at the finding.
If you may work on it, or it is assigned to you, you can change its stage, add a comment and add a photo. If you may assign it, you can choose who it is assigned to. Each control appears only for people allowed to use it.
The red number on the Findings tab is how many open findings are assigned to you, refreshed every few minutes. The app also keeps the 25 most recently updated open findings assigned to you ready to open with no signal (their details, history and evidence images), refreshing them in the background whenever it syncs. So the morning's work list is on the phone before you lose signal on site. Encrypted evidence images are not stored on the phone.
Every finding created, changed, commented on or photographed from the phone goes through one queue on the phone. The cloud button at the top of the Findings tab shows how many items are in it, and opens it:
| State | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Waiting | Saved on the phone; goes out by itself at the next chance (signal back, app opened, or every 15 minutes). |
| Sending | Going out now. |
| Failed | The server refused it, or it ran out of retries. The reason is shown in the server's own words, with Retry and Discard. |
| Changed by someone else — review | Someone changed the finding before your offline change arrived. You see the finding as it is now beside your change: Apply mine, Keep theirs, or open the finding. |
An item with several steps says how far it got, for example "created — the photo is not uploaded yet". A retry carries on from there. A finding is never created twice, and a photo never attached twice, however often a send is repeated.
On a construction site, the design says what should be built, and the schedule says when. The phone is where someone on site says what has been built. Tap the Site Progress card on the Home screen. Every kind of account can open it; whether you may record on a particular site is set per site, and the app shows it on each site's row. (The companion paper From design to measured progress covers the design and schedule side.)
The Site Progress screen lists every site with a current design that you can see. Open one, and it shows:
Tap an object on the map, or in an activity, to record progress on it. If several objects are under your finger, you choose which.
With signal, the photos, voice note and entry are sent before the screen closes. Without it, the whole entry is saved on the phone and sent when signal returns; the Site Progress screen lists entries still on their way, and any the server refused, in its own words, with Retry and Discard. An entry is never recorded twice, however often it is sent.
Open a site once with signal and the app saves it for offline use:
Opened with no signal, the site shows what was saved and says when. The map has two backgrounds: Hybrid (satellite imagery with roads) needs a connection, and offline the app says "Satellite needs a connection" and offers the street map; Street works offline from the saved copy. If your Omniris service has no offline street map, the screen says so, and the objects and recording still work offline.
Each saved site has Remove offline copy, which removes its saved objects, activities and street map but keeps any entries still waiting to be sent. A site you can no longer see is removed from the phone automatically the next time the full site list loads.
AI detection finds objects in photos automatically, but a person should check the result before anyone relies on it. Verification is that check: a person corrects the AI's boxes and outlines where they are wrong and marks the photo Verified. The phone has the same editor as the website and the desktop application, so a reviewer can do this anywhere. (The companion paper on AI detection and verification covers the editor in full.)
The editor itself is built into the app, so it opens with no connection at all. To check photos offline, open their folder with signal first and choose Make available offline for verifying. The app says how much it will download, then saves each photo, its AI results and its outlines on the phone.
Corrections are saved as a draft as you work. Press Verify offline and the app says "Sent for verification — waiting for a connection", freezes that draft exactly as it was, and sends it when signal returns. A photo that was not made available offline cannot be verified offline, and the editor says so: "You're offline — this image wasn't made available offline. Verify when you're back online."
No answer is not the same as no signal, and the editor tells them apart. With signal but a server that does not reply, the editor says "Kept on this phone" where it would say "Saved", tells you "The server isn't answering", keeps trying by itself, waiting a little longer each time, and goes back to normal on its own when the server answers.
Flyability is Omniris's fly / no-fly forecast for drone work. The Home screen shows a 14-day strip for your location, each day with a colour-coded score, the temperature range, the weather and how good satellite positioning will be. Open shows the full 14-day list.
The location is the one you chose, or else your saved address, or else where the phone is now. To change it, search for a place by name, use your current location, or go back to your saved address.
Tap a day for its full breakdown:
The forecast refreshes every 10 minutes while the app is open. With no signal, the last forecast for that area is shown.
The Upcoming Flights card marks each planned flight on a month calendar and lists every upcoming flight, including assigned flights whose date is not set yet. Tap a marked day to see just that day's flights, or a flight to open its job.
Once a job is yours, its page shows a Job Workflow with everything for the day on site:
When the client has marked places that need photos taken from the ground, a tile shows how many are covered (for example "2 of 5 locations captured"), in orange until all are done. It opens a full-screen map (satellite, hybrid or streets) with every location, your own position and a trail of where you have walked. Tap a location to read the client's note and take photos that count toward it.
The assessment US rules (14 CFR §107.49) require before every flight, done on the tailgate rather than at a desk (details below).
A grid of every photo for the job, newest first, and a camera that stays open across shots. Each photo is stamped with the phone's location and queued for upload into the job's delivery folder. Hold the shutter to record a voice note that goes with the next photo. Tap a photo in the grid to see it with its notes.
Photos from the drone's memory card (see Uploading from the phone).
File a finding in the job's delivery folder (see Findings on site).
Submit Results sends the job to the client, and the job then shows "Awaiting client review". On a job shared with your organization, members upload their photos and the organization's manager submits. An assigned job you cannot do can be returned.
Pick a checklist: the built-in one, or one you or your organization made, each showing how many items it has and how many are required. Items are grouped (operating environment, crew, aircraft, payload, regulatory, site), and each is answered OK, N/A or Issue.
On many sites the signal comes and goes. The app is built on one rule: what you do is saved on the phone first, then sent. A lost connection does not stop you working; it delays the sending.
flowchart LR A[You save a change
on the phone] --> B[Kept on the phone] B --> C{Server answers?} C -- yes --> D[Done] C -- no answer --> E[Waits in the queue] E -- signal back, app opened,
or every 15 minutes --> C C -- refused --> F[Shown with the reason:
Retry or Discard] C -- changed by someone else --> G[Both versions shown:
you choose]
| Works offline | How |
|---|---|
| Taking and importing photos | Kept on the phone and uploaded when signal returns. |
| Filing and working on findings | Created, changed, commented on and photographed offline; sent through the findings queue. |
| Your assigned findings | The 25 most recently updated open ones are kept ready to open. |
| Recording construction progress | Sites opened once with signal work fully offline, street map included. |
| Checking AI results | For photos made available offline, for 30 days. |
| Pre-flight checklists | Once started, answered and completed offline. |
| Messages | Your conversations are on the phone; new messages go out when signal returns. |
| Your jobs | A job's page opens from the copy of your jobs kept on the phone. A job you have applied for but are not yet assigned is kept as the website shows it before assignment: an approximate, city-level location, without the site boundaries, street address, contact, access instructions or notes. |
| Folders, forecast, account details | The last answer the server gave is shown. |
Some things need a connection: starting processing jobs, opening a folder or photo you have not opened before, satellite imagery, the 3D viewers, and starting (or discarding) a pre-flight checklist.
The app tells "no signal" and "the server is not answering" apart, and says which:
The quoted messages above use illustrative example values.
The app shows what needs you inside the app, where you will see it when you open it:
They refresh by themselves while the app is open, and Home refreshes each time you return to it.
The phone app is one way into Omniris. These papers cover what it connects to: