Flight History of a Specific Flight & Improved Date Control for Flight Status API

We are excited to announce two important updates to the flight history, flight status and flight history capabilities of AeroDataBox API. These updates directly address long-standing user requests to improving access to the flight data.

1. History and Scheduled of a Specific Flight by Range of Dates

We have introduced a new endpoint that allows retrieving flight history and scheduled operations within a specified date range for specific flights. This long-requested addition enhances the existing Flight Status endpoint by enabling insights across multiple days instead of being limited to a single or nearest date.

Why We Made This Change

Previously, users could only query flight details for a single day only, making it difficult to analyze historical trends of specific flights, as that would not only require multiple Flight Status API calls, but also the prior knowledge of when the flight operates.

Many customers expressed the need for a way to retrieve flight history or upcoming schedules over a period of time. This new endpoint fulfills that request and enables insights into frequency, operational patterns, and historical performance of specific flights.

Summary

Flight History & Schedule API endpoint returns a list of past, current, and scheduled flight movements within a selected range of dates for a specific flight. Similar to the Flight Status API endpoint, it supports searching the flights by by flight number, ATC call-sign, aircraft registration, or 24-bit ICAO Mode-S address.

Pricing

The new endpoint is already available for use. Unlike single-day Flight Status API, it is placed under Tier 3, with different data range limits applicable based on your subscription level:

• Basic & Pro plans; Sulu Hub subscribers: 7-day history/schedule per API request.
• Ultra plan: 14-day range.
• Mega plan: 30-day range.

Technical Details

The endpoint can be accessed by calling:

GET /flights/{searchBy}/{searchParam}/{dateFromLocal}/{dateToLocal}

Path Parameters:

• searchBy – Criteria for flight search (Available values: Number, Reg, CallSign, Icao24).
• searchParam – Value based on search criteria (e.g., flight number, ATC call-sign, aircraft tail number, or ICAO 24-bit Mode-S address).
• dateFromLocal – Start date of the range (format: YYYY-MM-DD).
• dateToLocal – End date of the range (format: YYYY-MM-DD).

Example Usage:
GET /flights/number/DL47/2025-02-01/2025-02-06
Retrieves all DL47 flights operated between February 1, 2025, and February 6, 2025.

2. Controllable Date Parameter for Flights Status API

A new optional query string parameter, dateLocalRole, has been added to both the Flight Status and the aforementioned new Flight History & Schedule endpoints.

Why We Made This Change

Initially, the Flight Status API interpreted date parameters as either departure or arrival date of the flight, meaning flights were returned if they either departed or arrived on that date in the local timezone of the airport of origin or destination.

While this behavior allowed for the best results, it sometimes led to confusion when dealing with flights that operated overnight on a daily basis. For example, a flight departing late in the evening and arriving past midnight would appear in results for both dates, leading to more results than could be reasonably expected.

For example, requesting flight status for Delta flight DL46 on 2025-01-31 (January 31, 2025) would make API return two flights:

DL46 departing JFK 2025-01-30 16:45 arriving 2025-01-31 05:55
DL46 departing JFK 2025-01-31 16:45 arriving 2025-02-01 05:55

Even though this did not pose a critical problem, as undesired flights could have always been easily filtered out on the recipient end, we received a few request to make the behavior of this date controllable.

Technical Details

New optional query string parameter allows customizing this behavior. It allows three possible values:

• Both (default, recommended for best results): Matches flights departing or arriving on the specified date.
• Departure: Matches only flights departing on the specified date.
• Arrival: Matches only flights arriving on the specified date.

This update ensures greater flexibility while maintaining backward compatibility for the existing users. If dateLocalRole is omitted, the default behavior remains unchanged.

Example Usage:

• GET /flights/number/KL682/2025-02-01?dateLocalRole=Departure
  → Returns KL682 flights departing on February 1, 2025 in the local timezone of origin.
• GET /flights/number/KL682/2025-02-02?dateLocalRole=Arrival
  → Returns KL682 flights arriving on February 2, 2025 in the local timezone of destination.
• GET /flights/number/KL682/2025-02-02
  or
  GET /flights/number/KL682/2025-02-02?dateLocalRole=Both
  → Returns KL682 flights departing or arriving on February 2, 2025 in the local timezone of origin or destination, respectively.

Detailed documentations and downloadable OpenAPI specification can be found in our API Documentation. We appreciate your feedback and look forward to further refining our services to meet your needs!