argen, Mesh

I have ventured into #Meshtastic and it looks pretty cool

Andrew Woodward

Update

Since the post below, I have switched to Meshcore but what remains below is valid.

Here’s a little geeky project. It’s a good USD60 (AUD100) to spend. Read on.

One of the buzzier things in radio land is mesh networking… not wifi mesh… radio mesh. It’s called Meshtastic and doesn’t require a licence. It’s all open source and it’s super Apple friendly, more so than Windows and Android. 

A whole lot of devices are coming onto the market that are tiny radios that talk to each other and can pass on text messages or track things. It’s sort of like SMS for UHF or CB walkie-talkies. It doesn’t use the phone network, but it can use your iPhone or Mac. 

So, they use your iPhone and Bluetooth connection. But, what’s the big deal?

Use case #1

Well, when you are hiking and out of cell range, your Meshtastic device could be in range, and you can send and receive messages to other devices via Bluetooth on your iPhone. Or you can leave a few on your route or trail to communicate back to civilisation. They are low-power little radios, half the size of a deck of cards. If there is a group of you out and about, you can still message each other through your iPhones without a cell connection, providing you are in radio range and each have a unit. And there are Meshgroups springing up everywhere, Here’s a global map

Use case #2

Another use case for you is at trade shows where cell and wifi can be bad. Answer: Put a Meshtastic node on each person on your team who are on the show floor, and you can message them directly or in a group, and it’s encrypted. 

Use case #3

Then there’s the use case if the power or cell phone grids go down, you can communicate with other Mesh uses.  

It’s pretty cool. It’s messaging without cell or wifi and without bulky radio walkie-talkies for voice. You can message ‘everyone’, your group, or directly to an individual unit.

Further, Meshtastic has some fantastic Apple apps. My plan is to keep my current one on me with any iPhone and get another one as a client base for home, connected to my Mac. I’ll also get a repeater for my house as a contribution to the community and network. Two units and a repeater are USD200. 

Here are some good explainers:

There are four things to keep in mind:

1. In the USA and Australia, Meshtastic uses 915 MHz. They use 868 MHz in Europe – make sure you get the right unit.

2. You’ll hear another mode – MeshCore. That’s for if you really get into it. Make sure you get a Meshtastic radio.

3. A few sites promote the nodes/clients/units as walkie-talkies. They’re not. They don’t do voice. They are data only for messaging and tracking.

4. There are lots of units around with not commonly known brand names. I got a ThinkNode M5 from Elecrow, and it’s quality kit for the price.  

Now you can flick a switch to enable you to communicate with other devices on Meshtastic via the internet. So, one person can be off cell/wifi grid and the other can be on grid. Watch this.

Here are some links to get into it:

If you want to know the difference between Meshtastic and MeshCore, watch this:

6 May 2025