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Comparison · Infra & APIs

inlabru vs radiatR

A side-by-side editorial comparison of inlabru and radiatR — release velocity, themes, recent moves, and the top alternatives to consider.

Shared themes:r-package

inlabru vs radiatR: at a glance

FeatureinlabruradiatR
SectorInfra & APIsInfra & APIs
Velocity score2.52.5
Sparks · 30d00
Top themesbayesian-modelling, spatial-statistics, r-package, api-consolidationcircular-statistics, animal-movement, r-package, shiny-app
Last editorial update34m ago1h ago
WebsiteVisit →Visit →

What is inlabru?

A Bayesian spatial modelling package rebuilding its foundations one breaking release at a time

inlabru wraps INLA for spatial, point-process and latent-Gaussian models in R. It is mid-modernisation: since 2.12.0 cut the sp stack, each release has renamed part of the public surface, standardised how external packages attach custom mappers, or replaced internal machinery. 2.15.0 is the latest step, pairing a new predictor evaluation and linearisation implementation with broom's tidy(), glance() and augment() methods and four non-zero-truncated observation families.

Read the full inlabru trajectory →

What is radiatR?

A circular-statistics toolkit for animal movement, shipped and then tightened in three weeks.

radiatR reads movement trajectories, plots them on circular axes, computes kinematics such as speed and path sinuosity, and runs the circular statistics that go with them, including tests of mean direction, symmetry and unimodality. It arrived as a first public release on 9 July 2026 with an accompanying Shiny app, and has had two releases since at roughly weekly intervals. The 0.1.x line is still setting its boundaries: 0.1.2 removes a loader dialect and makes previously silent data problems into errors.

Read the full radiatR trajectory →

inlabru vs radiatR: editorial side-by-side

I
inlabru
INFRA · APIS
2.5

A Bayesian spatial modelling package rebuilding its foundations one breaking release at a time

◆ Current state

inlabru wraps INLA for spatial, point-process and latent-Gaussian models in R. It is mid-modernisation: since 2.12.0 cut the sp stack, each release has renamed part of the public surface, standardised how external packages attach custom mappers, or replaced internal machinery. 2.15.0 is the latest step, pairing a new predictor evaluation and linearisation implementation with broom's tidy(), glance() and augment() methods and four non-zero-truncated observation families.

◆ Where it's heading

The arc is consolidation of the extension surface rather than expansion of the model catalogue. Every release adds mappers or families with one hand and removes a dependency, a re-export or a deprecated path with the other — plyr in 2.15.0, fmesher's Depends entry in 2.14.1, sp and ggmap in 2.12.0. The compatibility flag bru_compat_pre_2_14_enable and the temporary fm_int/fm_pixels re-exports show a maintainer sequencing breaks across releases instead of landing them together.

◆ Prediction

The 2.14 compatibility flag is still defaulting to TRUE and the fmesher re-exports are described in the entries as temporary, so the next obvious move is a release that flips bru_compat_pre_2_14_enable off and drops those re-exports.

R
radiatR
INFRA · APIS
2.5

A circular-statistics toolkit for animal movement, shipped and then tightened in three weeks.

◆ Current state

radiatR reads movement trajectories, plots them on circular axes, computes kinematics such as speed and path sinuosity, and runs the circular statistics that go with them, including tests of mean direction, symmetry and unimodality. It arrived as a first public release on 9 July 2026 with an accompanying Shiny app, and has had two releases since at roughly weekly intervals. The 0.1.x line is still setting its boundaries: 0.1.2 removes a loader dialect and makes previously silent data problems into errors.

◆ Where it's heading

Three releases in twelve days show a package hardening in public rather than accreting features. The direction of travel is toward refusing bad input instead of quietly working around it: non-finite coordinate rows now error by default rather than being dropped silently, combining Tracks objects rejects colliding trajectory ids and conflicting calibration metadata instead of merging them and discarding one side, and the Shiny app clears prior state before reading a new upload. The statistical surface is growing in parallel, but within the scope the first release already claimed.

◆ Prediction

Expect the remaining goodness-of-fit gap the notes name explicitly, Jones-Pewsey, to be filled in a later release, and the error-on-bad-input treatment to reach the parts of the loader it has not yet covered. A CRAN submission is the natural next step for a package this young, though nothing in these entries commits to one.

Alternatives to inlabru and radiatR

Other Infra & APIs products tracked by Sparkpulse, ranked by recent ship velocity. Each card links to a full editorial trajectory and lets you pivot into a head-to-head comparison with either inlabru or radiatR.

See all inlabru alternatives → · See all radiatR alternatives →

Recent activity from inlabru and radiatR

Latest ship moves from both products, interleaved chronologically. ⚡ = editorial spark.

  1. 23d agoinlabruPredictor linearisation rewritten; broom tidiers, truncated families
  2. 29d agoradiatRctrax loader dropped; bad coordinates now error by default
  3. 1mo agoradiatRWrapped-Cauchy and Pycke tests close two statistical gaps
  4. 1mo agoradiatRFirst public release
  5. 3mo agoinlabruBugfix release: factor contrasts, raster extraction, error classes
  6. 5mo agoinlabruNew mappers, standardised cgeneric support, bru_obs storage refactor
  7. 1y agoinlabruMapper classes shortened to bm_*, experimental predictor aggregation
  8. 1y agoinlabruDrops sp and ggmap for an sf-native spatial stack

Frequently asked questions

What is the difference between inlabru and radiatR?

Both compete on the same themes — r-package — within Infra & APIs. inlabru and radiatR are shipping at a similar cadence (velocity 2.5 vs 2.5, both within Sparkpulse's "active" band). See the at-a-glance table above for a side-by-side breakdown of velocity, recent sparks, and editorial themes.

Is inlabru better than radiatR?

Sparkpulse doesn't pick a winner — we score release velocity, not feature parity. inlabru and radiatR are shipping at a similar cadence (velocity 2.5 vs 2.5, both within Sparkpulse's "active" band). For your specific use case, the alternatives sections above list other Infra & APIs products to evaluate alongside.

What are the best alternatives to inlabru?

Top inlabru alternatives in Infra & APIs are ranked by recent ship velocity. Browse the "inlabru alternatives" section above for the current picks, or visit /alternatives/inlabru for the full list with editorial commentary on each.

What are the best alternatives to radiatR?

Top radiatR alternatives in Infra & APIs are ranked by recent ship velocity. Browse the "radiatR alternatives" section above for the current picks, or visit /alternatives/radiatr for the full list with editorial commentary on each.