FiveM CAD Tablet: Opening the MDT In Game Without Leaving the Car

Every officer on your server has the same habit. A plate needs running, so they alt-tab to a browser, find the CAD tab among the other thirty, type the plate, and alt-tab back to find the suspect has driven off.

A FiveM CAD tablet removes the alt-tab. The MDT opens inside the game, over the dashboard, and the plate gets run while the car is still in view. Here is what the PlateNet tablet does, where to get it, and how to put it on a server in an evening.

What a FiveM CAD Tablet Actually Is

The PlateNet tablet is a FiveM resource that opens the CAD in a frame inside the game. It is not a copy of the CAD and it is not a cut-down version. It is the same PlateNet CAD/MDT your officers use in a browser, signed in as them, showing the same calls and the same records.

Press the key, and PATROL CAD is there: your status, the call you are on, the open queue. QUERY runs plates, people, and firearms. REPORTS files the arrest. HISTORY shows what happened on the last shift. If AutoDispatch is on for the community, it keeps routing calls and reading radio announcements whether the tablet is open or not.

Because it is the real CAD, anything a community adds on the web side is in the tablet the same day. When the civilian portal got its own layout, it opened in the tablet without a resource update.

Where to Get It

The tablet was released free on the Cfx.re forum in August 2026, in the thread Release: Free PlateNet CAD/MDT Tablet. The resource itself lives at github.com/scentral/platenet, where you can read every line of it before putting it on a server.

Two things to be clear about. Free means no charge, and the code is public so you can see what it sends and where. It is not an open licence to lift the code into another project; the repository's licence says so. And the tablet needs a PlateNet community behind it. It is the door to the CAD, not the CAD itself. The free CAD/MDT guide covers what the no-cost tier includes.

Installing It on the Server

The whole install is a folder, four lines of config, and a restart. The connect your game server page has the exact steps; this is the shape of it.

The folder

Clone or download the repository into your resources folder and keep the folder name exactly platenet. Renaming it is the most common way the install fails, because the resource refers to itself by that name.

The key

Sign in to PlateNet as the community owner and generate a game server key. Add it to server.cfg as the platenet_api_key convar, with the two permission lines the README gives you that stop clients reading it, then ensure platenet. The key is what lets the game server talk to the CAD on behalf of the community. Treat it like a password, because it is one.

The slug

Open config.lua and set Config.CommunitySlug to your community's slug, the short name in your PlateNet URL. Leave Config.GameUrl alone. Restart the server. The resource prints a banner on start that says whether it reached PlateNet and which community it reached.

Pairing a Player's Tablet

Players pair once, ever. The first time someone opens the tablet on a computer PlateNet has never seen, it shows a code instead of the CAD. They sign in at platenet.app/device in a browser, enter the code, check the preview names their community and callsign, and approve. The tablet connects on its own within seconds.

That is the only time they see a code. From then on the tablet opens straight into the CAD on that computer, in every community they belong to, until they unpair it. The pairing guide covers the error messages and what each one means.

Pairing is per device, not per server, which matters for communities whose members play on more than one server. One approval covers all of them.

Opening, Moving, and Rebinding It

/platenet opens the tablet, and so does F6 by default. Players who want a different key change it in the FiveM settings under Key Bindings, where it shows as Open PlateNet. Server owners who want a different default change Config.TabletKey in config.lua.

/platenet set puts the tablet into layout mode. Drag it where you want it, resize it, and finish. The position sticks. Officers who run a second monitor tend to shrink it into a corner; dispatchers who sit in a car tend to make it most of the screen.

The tablet commands reference lists every command the resource adds, including the two that are not about the tablet at all.

What Changes on Patrol

The visible change is that nobody alt-tabs. The quieter change is what the server now knows.

While an officer is on duty with a paired tablet, the resource reports their position. Dispatch does not get a map. It gets a line under the unit on the roster: the street, the direction of travel, the speed, and how old the report is. Smart dispatch uses the same position to work out which units are closest to a new call, so automatic assignment stops guessing and starts measuring.

Closing the game or crashing sets the officer off duty and detaches them from their calls, with a note on the call saying so. The call stays open for a dispatcher to decide what happens to it. Nothing is lost to a disconnect.

And when nobody is dispatching, which on most servers is most nights, the tablet is where self dispatch happens. An officer sees the open queue, attaches to a call, and goes, without anyone in a dispatch seat.

The Mistakes That Cost an Evening

Renaming the resource folder. Pasting the key without the permission lines, so any client can read it with a console command. Forgetting the slug, so the server connects to PlateNet but to no community. Expecting a live map, which the tablet does not draw and does not need to.

Each of those is a two-minute fix once you know to look. The banner on resource start names the first three.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is the PlateNet FiveM tablet free?

Yes. The resource is free to download and run, and the source is public on GitHub. It connects to a PlateNet community, which has a free tier. The code is published to be read and used with PlateNet, not relicensed into other projects.

Does the tablet work with QBCore or ESX?

Yes. It is standalone. It does not read your framework's player data and does not need a framework at all. It needs FiveM, the resource folder, a key in server.cfg, and a community slug.

Do players need an account before they can open it?

To use the CAD, yes, the same account they use in the browser. Pairing links the game device to that account. The one exception is the emergency call command, which anyone on the server can use without pairing; the /911 command guide covers it.

Does it slow the server down?

No measurable amount. The CAD runs on PlateNet's servers and the tablet is a frame showing it. The resource itself sends a position report while a unit is on duty and otherwise sits idle.

Can civilians use the tablet?

Yes. Every member of a community gets the tablet, and the civilian pages open inside it. A civilian can create a character, register a vehicle, or submit an emergency call from the game.

What if the tablet shows a code every time?

The device was not approved, or it was unpaired. Approve the code at platenet.app/device from the account that should own the device. If it says the tablet is already paired, another account holds it and has to release it first.