Data checked 2026-08-13. Data may be stale - beyond the review cycle.
Review cycles are documented on the Methodology page. Methodology
cleanflight/cleanflight
Flight Stack Tier A flight_control GPL-3.0
Clean-code version of the baseflight flight controller firmware
Engineering Snapshot
Use cases & tasks 4
- Best suited for
-
- Engineers maintaining or extending STM32 flight controller firmware
- Developers targeting multi-rotor and fixed-wing platforms
- Primary tasks
-
- Flight control firmware for quadcopters and other UAVs
- Base for downstream forks (Betaflight, INAV)
Stack & ecosystem
- Resource type
- Flight Stack
- Ecosystem
- betaflight · cleanflight · embedded · flight-controller · inav · quadcopter
License & compliance
- License
-
GPL-3.0(Inferred)
Lifecycle & freshness Show
- Maintenance
- Active
- Latest version
- Not recorded
- Last activity
- 2026-08-10
- Last checked
- 2026-08-13
- Verification
- Official confirmed
What It Solves
Cleanflight is a clean-code fork of Baseflight flight controller firmware for STM32-based boards, serving as the upstream codebase for Betaflight and INAV.
Primary use cases
- Flight control firmware for quadcopters and other UAVs
- Base for downstream forks (Betaflight, INAV)
Secondary use cases
- Educational reference for embedded flight control
- Custom hardware bring-up on supported STM32 targets
When to Use
Consider when
- Need a GPL-3.0 licensed flight stack with active maintenance
- Target hardware is supported by Cleanflight's board definitions
- Downstream fork features (Betaflight/INAV) are not required
Verify before adopting
- Hardware target support in current tree
- GPL-3.0 compliance for commercial distribution
- Active maintenance status for specific board
Where It Fits
Stack layer flight_control
Downstream / used by
Start Here
Adoption Checklist
- Needs verification Hardware target support in current tree
- Needs verification GPL-3.0 compliance for commercial distribution
- Needs verification Active maintenance status for specific board
Each check stays "needs verification" until an official source confirms it; unconfirmed items are never marked verified.
Known Limitations & Unknowns
Known limitations
- No official release version or date in metadata
- Hardware target list not enumerated in supplied data
- Protocol support (MAVLink, CRSF, etc.) not documented in supplied facts
Not publicly verified
- Current supported MCU families and board variants
- Real-time OS usage (bare-metal vs RTOS)
- CI/CD and testing infrastructure
Alternatives & Related Tools
Related tools
- betaflight — Supports
- inav — Supports
How is it used?
Start from the recorded entry points below, then validate against the technical checklist.
- Official site http://cleanflight.com
- Repository https://github.com/cleanflight/cleanflight
- Documentation http://cleanflight.com
Technical checklist
- OK License identified Recorded: GPL-3.0
- OK Maintenance signal Active
- OK Verification status Official confirmed
- OK Source evidence attached 1 source record(s)
- NEEDS REVIEW Latest version recorded Not recorded
Official Links
Metadata & Governance
| License | GPL-3.0 — Inferred |
|---|---|
| Commercial model | Unknown |
| Maintenance status | Active |
| Verification status | Official confirmed — Confirmed via the official repository API responses in SourceRefs below. |
| Latest version | Not recorded |
| Latest release | Not recorded |
| Last activity | 2026-08-10 |
| Last checked | 2026-08-13 |
| First seen | Not recorded |
Related Resources & Dependencies
- betaflight — supports (verified)
- inav — supports (verified)
Recent Activity
New resource: cleanflight
New repository resource added by the sprint promote pipeline.
Related Knowledge
Collections
- Open-Source Flight Control Stacks — Open-source autopilot firmware repositories for building or evaluating a flight stack.
- Evaluating Open-Source Flight Stacks — A structured path for comparing candidate open-source flight stacks on evidence, not marketing.