Getting Started with Vegetation Index Monitoring

Vegetation Index Monitoring turns Sentinel-2 satellite imagery into a continuous picture of how your fields are doing. Once you subscribe a field, Siora pulls every clear satellite image taken over it (going back up to 3 years) and updates it weekly throughout the year. You get 11 vegetation indices for every clear date, with maps, stats, trends, and an on-demand interpretation of what the numbers mean.

This guide walks you through the product end to end: subscribing, what to expect during the first activation, reading the dashboard, getting the most out of each section, and renewing or cancelling.

What you get with a subscription

A vegetation index subscription is yearly and priced per hectare. For each subscribed field you get:

• 11 vegetation indices computed for every clear-sky satellite acquisition (NDVI, NDRE, NDMI, EVI, MSAVI, BSI, GNDVI, MSI, NIRv, NDSI, OSAVI). See Indices Explained for what each one tells you.
• Up to 3 years of historical imagery, processed automatically when you first subscribe.
• Weekly updates for the full subscription year as new clear images come in.
• An interactive dashboard with heatmaps, per-date stats, health breakdowns, distribution histograms, and historical trend charts.
• AI Interpretation of the latest acquisition, in your account language.
• Split view with soil data if the field has a Siora soil analysis: see vegetation and soil side by side.
• Data exports as CSV (full time series) and Shapefile (georeferenced heatmap points).

Subscriptions are sold per field. Pricing is per hectare and shown in the order panel before you confirm. For current pricing, see your account.

Subscribing to a field

You can start a subscription from two places:

From the field’s order report. Open any field’s report and go to the Indexes tab. If the field is not yet subscribed, you will see an orange Unlock Monitoring button. Click it to launch the order flow.

From the order creation flow. When placing a new order, choose Vegetation Indexes in the Product Selector step.

In the order panel you will see:

• The product name and short description
• The per-hectare yearly price and the field’s total
• A summary of what is included: 11 indexes, 1 year forward monitoring, 3 years retrospective data
• Common use cases: crop stress detection, growth tracking, in-season yield estimation support, irrigation and moisture management, season-over-season comparison

Confirm the order to start the subscription. Payment is handled by Stripe.

First activation: what happens behind the scenes

The moment your payment is confirmed, Siora starts processing your field’s history. Here is what is happening:

1. Date discovery. Siora queries the Sentinel-2 archive for every image of your field over the last 3 years that has 40% or less cloud cover.
2. Per-date processing. For each clear date, the system downloads the relevant spectral bands at 10 meter resolution, removes any remaining clouds, clips everything to your field boundary, and computes all 11 indices in a single pass.
3. Stats and trend points. For every index on every date, Siora stores the field average, min, max, standard deviation, valid pixel count, a 20-bin distribution, and the percentage of healthy / marginal / stressed area.
4. Heatmap data. Up to 5,000 georeferenced points per index per date are sampled so the map can render quickly.

How long does it take? It depends on how many clear dates exist for your field. A small field in a sunny region might be ready in a few minutes. A large field in a cloudy region with dozens or hundreds of clear historical dates can take longer, anywhere from several minutes to a couple of hours. The dashboard updates as soon as the first date is processed, so you do not have to wait for the full backfill to start exploring.

You do not need to keep the dashboard open. The processing runs server-side. You can close the tab and come back later. The dashboard will show whatever has been processed so far.

Opening the dashboard for the first time

You can open the dashboard in two ways:

• From the Indexes tab in any active field’s order report, click Open Monitoring Dashboard.
• Directly at /indexes/:fieldId if you know the URL.

The dashboard has four main areas:

• Header at the top: field selector, subscription status, subscription progress bar, and export menu.
• Toolbar below the header: index selector and view mode toggle.
• Sidebar on the left (or below the map on mobile): all the analytics for the selected index and date.
• Map panel filling the rest: the interactive heatmap.

If the timeline is empty when you arrive (no dates processed yet), the sidebar shows an animated satellite icon with the message Processing Satellite Data and the dashboard polls in the background. As soon as the first date is ready, the timeline appears and you can start exploring.

Reading a single date

Once a date is loaded, the sidebar gives you everything you need to understand that snapshot.

Understanding the index (green info box at the top)

A short reminder of what the currently selected index measures, what to look for in the values, and how it can help you act. This is always at the top of the sidebar so you do not have to remember what every abbreviation means.

Acquisition date timeline

A scrollable horizontal list of every clear-sky date Siora has processed for your field. The selected date is highlighted. Use the left and right arrows to pan, or click the date picker icon to jump to a specific month (the system snaps to the nearest available clear date if your pick is cloudy).

Click any date in the timeline and the entire dashboard, sidebar and map, updates to that snapshot.

Field overview

For the selected date you see:

• Field average of the index across all valid pixels
• Minimum value
• Maximum value

Below that, the Area Health Breakdown shows the share of your field classified as healthy, marginal, or stressed for the selected index. Each index has its own thresholds (see Indices Explained for the reference table).

A small delta row underneath shows how each category changed since the previous acquisition (for example, +3.2% Healthy, −1.1% Stressed) so you can see whether the field is improving, stable, or declining.

Value distribution histogram

A bar chart showing how index values are distributed across your field on this date. Each of the 20 bars is colored by health classification (green, amber, red), so a healthy field shows a chart skewed toward green and a stressed field skews toward red. For the inverse indices (BSI, MSI, NDSI), low values are healthy, so the colors flip.

Historical trend chart

A line chart of how the index has evolved over time. Above the chart you can choose:

• Range: 1 month, 3 months, 1 year, or All
• Metric: field average, min, or max

This is the fastest way to spot whether the field is on its expected seasonal curve, lagging behind a previous year, or recovering after a stress event.

Switching dates and indices

Two controls drive most of your exploration:

• The index selector in the toolbar. Pick any of the 11 indices. The map heatmap, sidebar info box, stats, histogram, and trend all update immediately. The trend chart axis re-scales to that index’s value range.
• The timeline in the sidebar. Pick any clear date. The map and stats update to that snapshot. The trend chart still shows the full series, with a reference to the latest plotted date.

A few practical patterns:

• Start with NDVI for a general health overview.
• Switch to NDRE or GNDVI mid-season if you suspect nitrogen issues.
• Switch to NDMI or MSI during dry stretches to check water status.
• Use MSAVI or OSAVI in early growth stages when bare soil is still visible.

See Indices Explained for index-by-index guidance.

Using AI Interpretation

At the bottom of the sidebar, the AI Interpretation section gives you a plain-language reading of your field’s current state.

It is structured into three parts:

• What it means: a 2-sentence summary of overall field condition and the most important finding.
• Action Plan: 1 to 3 concrete steps you can take.
• Detailed Analysis: 3 to 4 sentences covering cross-index patterns, trend direction, and historical comparison.

To generate one, click Request Interpretation. The system pulls together the current snapshot across all 11 indices, the previous acquisition, the same period a year ago, and any soil data Siora has for the field, then produces a maximum 150-word interpretation in your account language.

A few things to know:

• It is only available for the latest clear date. This keeps the interpretation grounded in fresh, comparable data and avoids generating large numbers of historical interpretations that would not match what you see in the field today. Past interpretations that were generated when their date was the latest remain visible on those dates, but you cannot generate new ones for older dates.
• Once generated, it is cached. Repeating the request will return the same interpretation. There is no per-day or per-field limit.
• Language matches your account language. No separate setting is needed.

Combining indices with soil data

If the field has a Siora soil analysis, you can switch the dashboard from a single full-map view to a split view that shows vegetation on top and soil on the bottom.

In the toolbar, toggle the view mode from Single Index to Index + Soil Data.

In split view:

• Top half is the vegetation index heatmap for the selected date.
• Bottom half is the soil heatmap, with controls to choose:
• Soil sample date if you have multiple analyses
• Soil property: N, P, K, SOM, pH, or any other property in your soil result

When you switch indices, the dashboard pre-selects the most relevant soil property for you. For example, NDRE pairs with N (nitrogen), NDMI pairs with SOM (soil organic matter), and BSI pairs with pH. You can change it at any time.

Below the soil map you get a summary panel with average, min, max, and a horizontal bar showing the share of the field classified as low, optimal, or high for that soil property.

If the field does not have soil data yet, the bottom half shows a prompt to run a soil analysis with an Analyze button that takes you to the soil order flow.

Exporting your data

When the subscription is active, the export menu in the header offers:

• CSV Data: the full time series across all dates and all 11 indices. One row per index per date, with columns for date, index, average, min, max, standard deviation, valid pixel count, and the healthy / marginal / stressed percentages. Good for analysis in Excel, Google Sheets, or your own tools.
• SHP Data: a Shapefile (zipped) containing georeferenced points of the heatmap for one index on one date, with the index value as a weight attribute. Good for opening in QGIS, ArcGIS, or feeding into a precision agriculture tool.

Exports are generated immediately. There are no rate limits or file size caps.

Renewal and cancellation

Subscription length

A subscription runs for one year from the date of purchase. The header shows a subscription progress bar so you always know how much of the year has elapsed.

Renewal

Subscriptions do not auto-renew. To continue monitoring after the year ends, you renew manually. As you approach the end of your subscription, a Renew Monitoring button appears in the dashboard header and on the field’s Indexes tab. Click it to start a fresh subscription year.

Cancellation

Because there is no auto-renew, there is no recurring charge to cancel. Your subscription simply ends at the end of the paid year. If you want to stop using monitoring, you do not need to do anything.

What happens when a subscription expires

When your subscription year ends, the dashboard switches to an expired state and the Indexes tab in your order report shows a Renew Monitoring button. Renew at any time to pick up where you left off (your historical data is preserved and immediately accessible again).

When something looks wrong

"No dates" or an empty timeline

If your field is freshly subscribed and the timeline is empty, processing is still running. Leave the dashboard open or come back later.

If your field has been subscribed for a while and the timeline is empty, this almost always means there have been no clear-sky satellite passes over your field recently or in the lookback window. This is normal in cloudy regions and during cloudy seasons.

A long gap in the timeline

Sentinel-2 revisits the same point every few days, but Siora only includes images with 40% or less cloud cover. In persistently cloudy regions or seasons, you may see gaps of weeks or even more than a month between clear dates. There is nothing to fix on your end: the next clear pass will appear in the timeline as soon as it is processed.

"Failed to fetch monitoring data" red banner

This is a generic error covering anything from a temporary network issue to a backend hiccup. Reload the page first. If it keeps happening, contact support.

The processing message will not go away

Processing time depends on how many clear historical dates your field has. A field in a cloudy region with many years of clear imagery can take a while. If the timeline is still empty after a couple of hours, contact support so we can check the job status.

My field’s edge has missing data

This can happen for fields that sit on a Sentinel-2 tile boundary, where a single satellite pass may only cover part of the field. The pixels that were not covered show as missing for that date. The next pass usually fills the gap. If the same area is consistently missing across many dates, contact support.

Something else

FAQ

Where is monitoring available? Anywhere Sentinel-2 covers, which is most of the world’s land. Coverage is fully supported across the EU. How frequently you get clear images depends on local cloud conditions.

How fresh is the data? Siora ingests new clear images on a weekly cycle. The actual cadence you experience depends on satellite revisit (every few days) and how often skies are clear over your field.

Can I share a field with another user? Not at the moment. Each field is tied to one account.

Is there a minimum field size? There is no enforced minimum for vegetation monitoring. Very small fields work, though at 10 meter pixel resolution they will have fewer data points per date.

What languages does AI Interpretation support? Whatever your account language is set to.

Can I get a refund? Subscriptions are non-refundable.

How do I see the threshold values for healthy / marginal / stressed? See the reference table in Indices Explained.

For a deeper look at each of the 11 indices, head to Indices Explained.