My question is: when you look out the windshield and see contrails from other aircraft, how far away are the farthest contrails that you can see? (In MSFS 20204.)

I could guess... it looks like 10 miles to me, maybe 15. But I'd love an empirical answer to this. Does anyone know?

PSXTraffic lets you exclude injected traffic outside a certain radius. I'm wondering what the "event horizon" of that radius is, so that I can exclude traffic that would never be visible.

Thanks.

 

11 hours ago, prolixindec said:

My question is: when you look out the windshield and see contrails from other aircraft, how far away are the farthest contrails that you can see? (In MSFS 20204.)

I could guess... it looks like 10 miles to me, maybe 15. But I'd love an empirical answer to this. Does anyone know?

PSXTraffic lets you exclude injected traffic outside a certain radius. I'm wondering what the "event horizon" of that radius is, so that I can exclude traffic that would never be visible.

Thanks.

 

This is a really poor decision by MS/Asobo to limit the visibility of other aircraft.  I can see aircraft on TCAS, but not visually until very close.  PSXT/AIG traffic disappears a few miles away, when the resolution is perfectly capable of seeing them much further away.

For me, this is just about the biggest immersion killer in 2020/24.

Edited April 2, 20251 yr by MrBitstFlyer

12 hours ago, prolixindec said:

My question is: when you look out the windshield and see contrails from other aircraft, how far away are the farthest contrails that you can see? (In MSFS 20204.)

I could guess... it looks like 10 miles to me, maybe 15. But I'd love an empirical answer to this. Does anyone know?

PSXTraffic lets you exclude injected traffic outside a certain radius. I'm wondering what the "event horizon" of that radius is, so that I can exclude traffic that would never be visible.

Thanks.

 

Ok so finally somebody is noticing this too.  For me this is the biggest stopper to switch to MSFS24.  

I am using AIG models with Just FLight models for now. Need to reinstall FSTL again. So not sure how it is with new updated FSTL models.   I am flying mainly on VATSIM so my tests were in VATSIM with AIG and Just Flight model matching.

But from my tests with a few other guys  - base game and SU1 in MSFS2024  you will see aircrafts and thier contrials from about 8nm.   On top of that what is strange is , that you will see those aircrafts with contrails for like a minute maybe and  after that they will suddenly dissappear.   This happen to me a few times. Like I saw plane with contrails flying from my right to left and then suddenly after a minute or mintue and half it was gone nothing in that spot anymore...  

When you are in ground waiting for PAX to board . You  can not see a single contrail in MSFS24.    Same as I wrote above. When you are in cruise. You see on ND via TCAS that there should be 3 planes around you within 20-24nm. You will check from cockpit or even from external view and well you will see nothing at all.     I really hope they will fix this DRAW distance /LOD distance soon. Hope they will bring it to MSFS20 levels.

From my tests in MSFS20. When you are on ground waiting for PAX to boad. You will see contrails in external view even from cockpit vies,  and when you zoom in you can even see strobe and navigation lights with a tiny model of plane. 

Same in cruise. When you are in cruise you will can see contrails and planes ( strobes and nav lights too ) from cca 25nm away from you.  Those are my testing with a few other friends.  So 25nm in MSFS20 vs cca 8nm in MSFS24 is quite a jump.

 

I have not had the time yet to test SU2. But maybe , as  you are writing , that it looks like you can see them from 10nm   , maybe ASOBO increased the DRAW distance.  I think I saw somebody was mentioning this on Asobo forum and here on Avsim forum too that they think in SU2 they can see the planes/contrailsl a bit further. 

 

 

You are definitively not alone, it IS an immersion killer. Like many other things related to AI traffic. If I am not wrong, some aspects of this totally borked LOD behaviour seems to be fixed in SU2, but others have to chime in as I am not in the beta. 

In general, AI traffic is ridiculous in MSFS2024, they somehow managed to get it even worse compared to MSFS2020, and it was already bad in the "old" sim. Unbelievable. Especially considering the fact that they invested quiet some resources in getting good looking AI models including some textures of the most prominent airlines, I do absolutely not get why they invest so little effort in a good AI traffic engine (including LODs etc.). 

I think the overall distance you can see aircrafts is 3km, after that they dissapear.

On 4/2/2025 at 3:22 PM, Jovzin said:

Ok so finally somebody is noticing this too.  For me this is the biggest stopper to switch to MSFS24.

Traffic visibility distance is atrocious in 2020 as well.

5 minutes ago, MrBitstFlyer said:

Traffic visibility distance is atrocious in 2020 as well.

That's not what's being discussed here but actually it's not nearly as bad as 24 in 2020...  24 was a clear regression.  At least in 2020 there are clearly contrails visible from the ground, Contrails of AI are visible for at least 20 miles once airborne, you will see a line of landing AI lights for 10-15 miles from the airport but for some reason 24 went backwards in this aspect. 

1 hour ago, psolk said:

That's not what's being discussed here but actually it's not nearly as bad as 24 in 2020...  24 was a clear regression.  At least in 2020 there are clearly contrails visible from the ground, Contrails of AI are visible for at least 20 miles once airborne, you will see a line of landing AI lights for 10-15 miles from the airport but for some reason 24 went backwards in this aspect. 

I do agree 2020 was better, but still bad.  You may see lights, but not the aircraft themselves until close.  

15 minutes ago, MrBitstFlyer said:

I do agree 2020 was better, but still bad.  You may see lights, but not the aircraft themselves until close.  

Agreed and they both seem to suffer badly from the front landing gear disappearing...  You will also often see the contrail but no plane...  One of the truly "weak" points of both sims

The other difference is AI ships...  In 2020 I can see them from cruise @FL350 whereas in 2024 I need to be right on top with the same LOD settings...

Edited April 3, 20251 yr by psolk
cant type with one hand

1 hour ago, psolk said:

The other difference is AI ships...  In 2020 I can see them from cruise @FL350 whereas in 2024 I need to be right on top with the same LOD settings...

This is another weird one - I can't see aircraft until very close, but I can often see even small ships miles away.  

2 hours ago, MrBitstFlyer said:

This is another weird one - I can't see aircraft until very close, but I can often see even small ships miles away.  

So you can see ships from cruise altitude @fl350 for example?  I haven't seen a single ship in 2024 when at cruise altitude even over busy shipping lanes where I see a number of boats in 2020 using GAIST.

7 minutes ago, psolk said:

So you can see ships from cruise altitude @fl350 for example?

FL350 - that's in space isn't it? 😁

Most of the time I'm in GA or helicopters, so I was really talking horizontal view distance.  I would assume no ships visible that high.  Those times I fly airliners I'm too caught up learning the systems to look outside 🤭

17 minutes ago, MrBitstFlyer said:

FL350 - that's in space isn't it? 😁

Most of the time I'm in GA or helicopters, so I was really talking horizontal view distance.  I would assume no ships visible that high.  Those times I fly airliners I'm too caught up learning the systems to look outside 🤭

LOL...  Fair enough!   

Yeah, just yesterday in 2020 I was passing the Alaska coastline at FL360 and was able to see a number of ships.  It actually looked like there were some in the sea ice as well so I help they are still afloat LOL.
It's also common over the Greek Isles as you traverse at altitude and certainly over the channel. 

Certainly not a deal breaker but something I've noticed moving back and forth. 

Edited April 3, 20251 yr by psolk

currently in the latest SU2 Beta I don't see any aircraft, I've set them to Real Time Online with Air Traffic set to ULTRA in the options, the EFB shows plenty of aircraft in my vicinity - however the G1000 shows absolutely nothing and I see absolutely nothing when according to the EFB a plane is right on top of me...something's broken.

So I just confirmed in 2020 Contrails are visible for ~35 miles... I managed to capture a screenshot of the TCAS on my PFD and the associated Contrail from AI ~35 miles away...  I also got some shots of Contrails while I was taxiing out which again, I have never seen that in 2024...