Hiri DesktopmacOS 14+ · Windows 10+

Earth observation on your desktop

Pick an area on a map, fill in a short form and press Run. Hiri finds the satellite imagery and elevation data it needs, so there is nothing to download or reproject first. Analyses run on your machine and nothing is uploaded.

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Requirements
macOS 14 or later on Apple Silicon. Windows 10 or 11 on x64, which installs per user, so no administrator rights are needed. Nothing else to install: the analysis runtime is bundled with the app.
Not built
There is no Intel macOS build. The macOS version floor is set by a Python wheel rather than by choice. There is no Linux build either; it is untested rather than impossible.

Guided analyses

Nine questions it answers for you

Urban growth
Where built-up land was gained or lost between two dates, in hectares
Green space
Vegetation extent, or how it changed between two dates
Land cover
Water, vegetation, built-up and bare soil, by index thresholds or K-Means, with a comparison against ESA's published map
Water
Surface water extent, before and after a flood
Burn severity
Fire severity in four classes, against the published dNBR thresholds
Growing season
Start, peak, end, length and productivity, per pixel, over a year
Vegetation indices
NDVI, NDRE, RECI, MNDWI, NDBI or NBR as a continuous surface
Terrain
Elevation, slope, aspect and hillshade. Bare-earth and about 10 m where United States coverage reaches, 30 m elsewhere
NDVI for one image
NDVI for a scene you picked by name

One screen serves both audiences: a short form with working defaults, and an Advanced section holding every threshold and weight behind the result. The analyst’s controls sit one disclosure away from the planner’s, not on a second screen.

Data sources

Imagery and elevation, fetched at run time

Cloud cover is shown per scene before you pick one.

When there is no usable imagery for an area and date, Hiri says so and suggests nearby dates.

Raster operations

Fourteen, for the steps in between

For what the nine analyses do not cover. They apply to any layer, including a GeoTIFF you imported.

Derive
Spectral index from bands you map; weighted overlay of up to four layers
Classify
Threshold; reclassify by ranges; K-Means grouping; majority filter; connected patch numbering; trace to polygons
Compare
Difference two layers
Spatial statistics
Zonal statistics per class; neighbourhood statistics; clusters and outliers (local Moran's I)
Terrain and water
Cut and fill volumes; D8 flow direction; flow accumulation

Limitations

What each result does not tell you

Every analysis reports its limitations next to its numbers, along with the parameters and source scenes that produced them. Two examples:

  • Urban growth uses a spectral index that cannot distinguish built surfaces from bare soil, so growth is overstated where ground has been cleared but not yet built on.
  • Elevation comes from one of two models. Only one of them includes buildings and tree canopy in its heights, so the result names which one covered your area.

What it does not do

  • Not a GIS. No editing, digitising, topology, cartography or print layouts. Hiri produces layers and numbers to take into QGIS or ArcGIS.
  • No vector or network analysis: no routing, isochrones or travel-time catchments.
  • No offline operation and no telemetry.

Exports

Formats your other tools open

Layers, for QGIS and ArcGIS
GeoTIFF · GeoJSON
Zonal statistics, for spreadsheets
CSV
Charts, for a document
PNG 1–4× · SVG
The map itself
PNG

Charts are drawn from the run’s own numbers and coloured to match the map: area by class, gain against loss, before and after, per-zone ranges and the season.

Projects save and reopen with their layers, opacity, legends and past runs. Long jobs stream progress and cancel cleanly.

Hiri Desktop is free, with no limit on what you run

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