The boating world, like much of the Western world, slows down in December. There's Christmas and New Years, but there's also the metaphorical 'turning over' of the boat biz. Boatbuilders use the changeover to ramp up for the upcoming season.
When BoatBlurb slowed down for the holidays, we decided to look back at our 2024 Tech Trends to see how we did.
Not to toot our own horn, but we were right about three of our four prognostications (the aluminum hull trend did not, in fact, go global... yet). It also gave us great perspective about what lies ahead.
Our trip to FLIBS in October gave us a glimpse at what's coming in 2025. Fort Lauderdale is cool like that -- you get to see new stuff on helms and hulls, but oftentimes it's not 'officially' available until the first quarter of 2025. It's a sneak peek.
Since we aim to stay ahead of the curve, here are five tech trends we think will go mainstream in 2025:
1) No, electrification isn't slowing down but it is narrowing in scope
The last several years have been a boon in electrification. That includes electric motors, battery systems, solar energy setups, and myriad other ways boatbuilders are adding electric tech to make boats not only more capable, but also more energy efficient.
That said, sometimes too much is exactly that -- too much. Boats with too many electric bells and whistles, especially products in their infancy, can be a turn off for consumers. If the product has a good track record, put it in the boat. If it's a potential novelty with no history, consumer get wary.
In other words, the last few years have seen a lot of electric products get added to a lot of boats. Boatbuilders big and small were putting electric motors on multiple models across multiple lines. Green energy companies were championing alternative power to every boater. It felt like every model and every size had an electric option, either on the transom or at the helm, or both. It was all too much. The technology needed to mature.
Heading into 2025, the industry is slowing the gold rush by simplifying electrification. Instead of 10 electric models, now it's one or two. Most electric models are marketed strictly for their electric capability. Instead of every yacht being outfitted with solar panels and alternative power sources, now there is one 'feature' model. In response, industry leaders are also sticking to the basics -- one model at a time. Scout Boats went singular with one model in partnership with Flux Marine. Harris did the same with the e-210 Pontoon. Four Winns runs a single electric model despite being one of the earlier adopters -- the H2e Bowrider. Chris-Craft keeps only the Launch 25 GTe. Axopar were the most ambitious (as you'll see in #5) by unveiling a line of boats - AX/E Boats -- but they had their reasons. Azimut went with the singular Seadeck 7 Hybrid.
The irony is that as the tech has gotten better, it's also gotten more focused. Instead of grandiose plans to put a little electric tech everywhere, companies are instead putting lots of electric tech somewhere. That's easier for builders and consumers. It also makes for a better and more trustworthy product.
Expect electrification to continue the rat race, but expect the scope to narrow significantly as the tech develops.
2) Digital currency for digital boats
The expansion of digital tech in boating no longer applies just to boats. It also applies to the currency used to purchase them.
The industry at large has been moving away from manual switches for years and towards an all-digital electronics suite,. In doing so, it brings a vast expansion in capability (although in some cases, boaters might rightly miss their manual switches in the event of failure/replacement). It's an inevitable evolution. Everything is going digital, there's no reason to think boating would be any different.
But now the money is going digital, too.
Several yacht manufacturers have been accepting Bitcoin for a few years, but largely without an official policy. When high rollers with lots of Bitcoin are looking to buy a multi-million dollar yacht, you find a way to accept payment. Now that mindset is going mainstream thanks to Virgin Cruises, the mammoth cruise ship conglomerate owned by Richard Branson, who announced they would accept Bitcoin for purchasing fares. Travelers buying an Annual Pass, which gives them access to any ship and any trip for an entire year, can be purchased using Bitcoin (for the equivalent of $120,00 USD). It's a sweet program for a sweet price. Even if digital money isn't your thing, you can still pay in cold hard cash as well.
As with all things, the trickle down effect is reaching smaller recreational boat manufacturers, as Twin Vee PowerCats will now accept Bitcoin for boat purchases. Ironically, they're also one of the first small boat manufacturers to promote going fully-digital, so it makes sense they would take the Bitcoin plunge. Forward thinking.
You can expect digital currency and other alternative forms of payment to become commonplace nearly everywhere, and boating will be no exception.
3) Autonomous docking is the future, it's just the scale that's up for debate
It's no secret autonomous docking will happen. With the scope of the investments by the big players, they've committed to the cause. But that's a good thing. The results are impressive. In 2022, a commercial Japanese freighter made a 240 mile autonomous journey and docked itself, cementing the notion that large-scale autonomous docking was possible. Generally speaking, bigger boats are easier to dock than smaller boats (within reason), so boaters wondered if autonomous docking could be scaled down to smaller vessels. Indeed it can.
In 2024, Brunswick impressed the entire boating industry by letting the media ride aboard a Boston Whaler 405 Conquest while it docked itself in a busy New York harbour. The boat nailed the maneuver every time. If autonomous docking was that effective, with a boat of that size, under those conditions, then it was only a matter of time until it could be scaled down once again. Things like autonomous delivery boats are already in development and may become the 'Amazon Delivery of the Sea.' Everything, big and small, feels possible.
Expect to see autonomous docking, or at least the beginnings of autonomous maneuverability, in smaller boats starting in 2025. Expect to see similar features, too, like AI-driven assistance for avoiding low speed contact with docks/boats, controlling a boat's GPS positioning when experiencing wind/waves, or managing turns in tight quarters.
That being said, small boats with small price tags won't dock themselves for years to come, but you can expect to see an increase in sensors, cameras, AI inputting, and related features in the 25-75 ft range starting now.
4) Like every other industry, the AI revolution will bring major investment to boating
This pairs nicely with #3 above, but hear me out. It's not just ChatGPT and OpenAI that will be making headlines in the tech biz in 2025. The boating biz will also get attention for its AI investments. Take a walk around CES and you'll understand why.
You're already seeing it everywhere, whether you realize it or not: there's an "AI option" for nearly every service. When you Google something, the results include an AI-driven answer stream. When you go on a website to contact customer service, you get an AI chatbot that interprets and responds to your writing. When you're driving a new vehicle, voice commands backed by AI interpret and respond to your voice ("Siri, find some yacht rock!").
Those same AI capabilities are coming to boating. It's because of two things: 1) the value of the technology for making people's lives easier, and 2) it's reached saturation in its first markets (mainly Silicon Valley) and is now ripe to be adopted by the economy at large. As you might expect, Brunswick Corporation is leading the charge. They have a new boating intelligence portfolio they unveiled at CES, which includes several indicators about the future They partnered with other AI firms who possess advanced AI to bring their capabilities into the marine fold. They have their own boating intelligence design lab at the University of Illinois.
Then there's the other big players in the game. Azimut partnered with Google to develop an AI voice command system for captains. Yamaha has invested $100 million into AI and robotics. This will fundamentally change the way captains interact with their boat and control its operation. The boat itself will become more intuitive, will be voice activated, or will have human error overridden in favour of user safety (i.e., automatically adjusting driving input while approaching a wave or wake to maintain vessel attitude).
It won't be long before you're saying: "Boaty, increase vessel speed to 25 mph, set a course for the sandbar, and turn the volume up!"
Is that such a bad thing?
5) Electric outboards have reached parity with gas-powered outboards, but will it matter?
Whatever guffawing is being made by gas-powered purists (much of it justified), there's just no denying that electric outboards are catching up. Yes, there are range issues. Yes, there are issues to be worked out with battery storage and capacity. It's no easy feat to install a large-scale electrification system into a hull that was designed to carry an outboard on the transom and a gas tank in its innards. But these problems can be overcome.
Electric motor manufacturers are quickly overcoming their power limitations and are starting to reach parity with their gas-powered counterparts. It started on the smaller scale, with companies like Mercury completing the Avator lineup with electric alternatives up to 15 hp. Yamaha just released the Harmo 2.0 electric outboard as their 10 hp equivalent. But that's just the beginning.
Canada's Vision Marine reached 180 horsepower with their E-Motion platform, which set world speed records, has been adopted by Beneteau, and will now collaborate on a pontoon with Smokercraft.
180 horsepower still not persuading you? There's more.
In 2024, a Canadian startup named Acel Power rocked the IBEX show in Tampa by hitting 250 horsepower with their IE 250 outboard. That marked the entry into the upper echelon of outboard power. Shockingly, Acel was quickly outdone by Axopar and Evoy Motors who dropped the impressive Storm 300 outboard at Fort Lauderdale two months later. The Storm 300 pushes 600 horsepower at full thrust, which puts it awfully close to the 'big dogs' in the outboard game. Axopar purchased a 10% stake in Evoy to develop their motors, so it makes sense they'd fully commit.
No, I don't think any electric company is going to topple a 600 horsepower V12 Verado any time soon, but it's not such a crazy idea anymore. The vast majority of outboards in use are between 25-150 horsepower. The numbers decline precipitously as you get into 200 hp, 300 hp, and so on.
Can electric outboards overcome their range issues to bite into the gas-powered market? Not so far, but if they can match high-end horsepower with enough range to compete (and without a skyrocketing pricetag), you're going to have some takers. Even the purists will have to take a closer look.
