MAVLink Support

R2026b

Micro Air Vehicle Link communication protocol dialects and messages

The Micro Air Vehicle Link (MAVLink) communication protocol is a message protocol for sending and receiving messages between UAVs. The protocol uses a publish-subscribe pattern for data streams with specified topics and message types. There are different sub-protocols for missions and parameters. Use the MAVLink supported functions to specify predefined or custom dialects, setup clients, and send or receive messages.

To protect UAVs from unauthorized messages, MAVLink uses message signing. Note that message signing is not the same as message encryption and MAVLink does not provide message encryption. For more information about MAVLink message signing, see MAVLink Message Signing (Authentication).

The MAVLink message definitions (dialects) and MAVLink serialization helper functions in UAV Toolbox are obtained from mavlink/message_definitions/v1.0/ and mavlink/c_library_v2 version of repositories respectively.

The message definition XML files and the C-language version of serialization helper functions are made available under the MIT license.

Objects

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MAVLink Client Connection

`mavlinkio`	Create local MAVLink client
`mavlinkclient`	Store remote MAVLink client information
`mavlinksigning`	Store MAVLink signing channel information (Since R2022a)

MAVLink Messages

`mavlinkdialect`	Parse and store MAVLink dialect XML
`mavlinksub`	Receive MAVLink messages
`mavlinktlog`	Read MAVLink message from TLOG file

MAVLink Microservice

`heartbeatMicroservice`	MAVLink Heartbeat microservice object (Since R2026b)
`parameterMicroservice`	MAVLink Parameter microservice (Since R2026b)
`missionMicroservice`	MAVLink mission microservice object (Since R2026b)
`commandMicroservice`	MAVLink Command microservice object (Since R2026b)
`ftpMicroservice`	MAVLink FTP microservice object (Since R2026b)

Functions

`mavlinkmicroservice`	Create MAVLink Microservice Object (Since R2026b)
`addmavlinkkeys`	Add MAVLink keys from `.env` file (Since R2023a)
`lsmavlinkkeys`	List MAVLink keys in MATLAB session (Since R2023a)
`rmmavlinkkeys`	Remove MAVLink key from MATLAB session (Since R2023a)

Blocks

	MAVLink Blank Message	Create blank MAVLink message bus by specifying payload information and MAVLink message type
	MAVLink Deserializer	Convert serialized `uint8` MAVLink data stream to Simulink nonvirtual bus
	MAVLink Serializer	Serialize MAVLink packet messages by converting a Simulink nonvirtual bus to a `uint8` data stream

Featured Examples

Visualize and Play Back MAVLink Flight Log in 3D Scenario

Load a telemetry log (TLOG) containing MAVLink packets into MATLAB, then extract messages for plotting

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Receive Mission and Flight Parameter Data in Simulink Using MAVLink Microservices

Implement MAVLink Microservices in Simulink to receive mission and flight parameter data from QGroundControl.

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