INAV Safe Home Point

Safehome is an optional safe landing point for aircraft that replaces the default 'Home' (takeoff point) as the landing coordinates during Return-to-Home (RTH) or Failsafe, preventing return failures or dangerous landings due to complex terrain.

Safehome (safe return point) is a set of GPS coordinates used to identify a safe landing location. You can define up to 8 safehome points for different frequently visited locations.

How It Works

1. Pre-flight Check

When the flight controller is armed, it checks all safehome points and automatically selects the closest enabled safehome within the safehome_max_distance (default 200 meters) from the current position as the alternate return point.

2. Behavior When RTH (Return-to-Home) is Activated

• Whether RTH is triggered manually by the RC transmitter or by failsafe (RX failsafe), the flight controller will use this safehome as the return target point.
• If RTH is canceled during the return (for example, when RC control is regained), the return point will revert to the default takeoff point (arming point).

Parameter Value	Meaning
OFF	Do not use Safehome
RTH	Use Safehome when manually entering RTH or during failsafe
RTH_FS	Use Safehome only when entering RTH due to failsafe (recommended setting)

Usage Recommendations

• If you typically use RTH to return to the takeoff point rather than safehome, you can use RTH_FS mode. After testing that safehome works once, confirm the functionality is normal.
• When using RTH_FS, ensure the receiver's failsafe settings correctly trigger INAV's failsafe mode (rather than methods like holding a specific output value).
• When selecting a safehome point, ensure there are no obstructions within a 50-meter radius (the loiter radius is controlled by the nav_fw_loiter_radius parameter). The approach/direction may vary during landing, so sufficient space should be reserved.
• If the safehome point is not visible before flight, exercise caution and you can disable the safehome function through the OSD menu before flying.

Related CLI Commands

safehome - List all safe return points

safehome reset - Clear all safe return points.

Up to 8 Safehome points can be set (numbered 0~7)

Important

safehome <index> <enabled> <latitude> <longitude>

<index>: Number 0~7

<enabled>: Whether to enable this Safehome, 1 for enabled, 0 for disabled

<latitude> / <longitude>: Latitude/Longitude * 1E7 (for example: 43.54648 → 435464800)

Example：

# safehome
safehome 0 1 543533190 -45179270
safehome 1 1 435464800 -78654500
safehome 2 1 513098420 -00956510
safehome 3 0 0 0
safehome 4 0 0 0
safehome 5 0 0 0
safehome 6 0 0 0
safehome 7 0 0 0

OSD Information Messages

• If a Safehome is selected during arming, it will display: H - DIST → SAFEHOME 1
• When using Safehome during RTH, it will display: DIVERTING TO SAFEHOME
• If a Safehome is found but the mode is OFF, it will display: SAFEHOME FOUND; MODE OFF

Recommendations

• When selecting a Safehome point, avoid obstacles and ensure the radius is greater than nav_fw_loiter_radius (recommended ≥50 meters);
• If the Safehome point is not within line of sight, it is recommended to conduct an on-site survey beforehand;
• You can manually disable Safehome using the OSD menu;
• After setting up, be sure to execute 'save' to save the configuration.

————This article is referenced from the INAV official website: https://github.com/iNavFlight/inav/blob/master/docs/Safehomes.md