accessing iPhone compass with JavaScript

Question

Know if it's possible to access the iPhone compass in Safari using JavaScript? I see how the GPS can be accessed, but I can't figure out the compass.

Answer 1

On iOS, you can retrieve the compass value like this.

window.addEventListener('deviceorientation', function(e) {
    console.log( e.webkitCompassHeading );
}, false);

For more informations, read the Apple DeviceOrientationEvent documentation.

Hope this helps.

Answer 2

You cannot access that information via javascript, unless you're using something like iPhoneGap

At the time this was true, in iOS 5 you can use the compass heading in JS. https://developer.apple.com/documentation/webkitjs/deviceorientationevent/1804777-webkitcompassheading