Dawn Patrol vs Waterspeed Sailing GPS Tracker
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Dawn Patrol
Track and analyze your surfing sessions with detailed metrics like wave count, speed, and distance. Integrates with Apple Watch and HealthKit for comprehensive workout data. Premium features offer advanced analytics and tide-wave correlations.
- Track and analyze surf sessions
- Record surf workouts
- Count waves and measure distance
- View surf sessions on a map
- Integrates with Apple Watch and HealthKit
- Surfline forecast integration
- Advanced surf analytics
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Turn your Smartwatch into the ultimate surf watch with Dawn Patrol Dawn Patrol is a powerful surf tracker for Apple Watch and Garmin, giving you the tools to track, analyse and relive every surf session, right from your wrist. Get today's Surfline forecast for your favourite beaches, track your waves and performance, and see your most important surf data at a glance. With beautiful smartwatch faces and glancable widgets, Dawn Patrol puts the information you need right where you need it. The best part? The core Dawn Patrol experience is FREE for every surfer. Upgrade to **Soul Surfer** to unlock our full suite of premium surf features. FREE Features * Track and analyse your surf sessions * Record your surf workouts * Automatically count your waves * View every session on a map * Track your top speed * Beat your personal records * Measure your wave time * See your distance surfed per wave and across your entire session * Track heart rate and calories burned through Apple Health and Activity * Relive and share your surf sessions SOUL SURFER | PREMIUM FEATURES Available with a monthly or yearly subscription. Turn your smartwatch into a beautiful Surf Watch - See the latest surf forecast for your favourite spots directly on your wrist. Track your paddling - Understand how much you paddle, how efficiently you paddle and how your paddling changes from session to session. Advanced surf analytics - Go deeper into your performance. Understand your speed, identify where you're gaining and losing speed, and learn how to generate more speed when you need it most. Beautiful surf widgets - Get surf conditions and forecasts at a glance with beautifully designed widgets for your phone and smartwatch. Understand your local break - Analyse your sessions alongside tide and wave conditions to understand how your local spot performs and when you surf it best. Compare your boards - Get deeper insights into your performance across different boards and see what works best for you. Add photos to your sessions and boards - Build a richer history of your surfing by adding your own photos to sessions and boards. Get your Surfline Rewinds - Surfline Sessions compatible, watch back waves ridden in front of a Surfline camera WORKS WITH YOUR SMARTWATCH Dawn Patrol brings surf tracking to your wrist, with support for **Apple Watch and Garmin smartwatches**. Dawn Patrol integrates with Apple Health and Activity, allowing you to track heart rate and calories burned alongside your surf session data. Whether you're tracking waves, analysing your performance or checking the conditions before paddling out, Dawn Patrol gives you the surf data you need, right on your wrist. Your smartwatch is a Surf Watch. Just add Dawn Patrol! Happy surfing! --- SOUL SURFER SUBSCRIPTION DETAILS **Please note:** * The Soul Surfer subscription is available as a monthly or yearly subscription. * Payment will be charged to your App Store account at confirmation of purchase. * Your subscription automatically renews unless auto-renewal is turned off at least 24 hours before the end of the current subscription period. * Your account will be charged for renewal within 24 hours prior to the end of the current subscription period. * You can manage your subscription and turn off auto-renewal through your App Store account settings after purchase. * Any unused portion of a free trial period, where offered, will be forfeited when you purchase a subscription, where applicable. For the full Terms and Conditions of this service, please see the Dawn Patrol Terms and Privacy Policy. https://www.dawnpatrol.cloud/terms and https://www.dawnpatrol.cloud/privacy
Waterspeed Sailing GPS Tracker
Track your performance across over 30 water sports with detailed metrics like speed, distance, and wind conditions. Analyze your sessions, compare gear, and connect with a community of water sports enthusiasts. Offers advanced features for dedicated athletes.
- GPS tracking for 30+ water sports
- Detailed speed, distance, and duration metrics
- Wind, weather, and tide forecasts (Pro)
- Heart rate and gear logging
- Session history and progress tracking
- Live location sharing (Pro)
- Integration with Apple Watch, Garmin, Coros, Suunto
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Waterspeed is a GPS tracker for sailing, wingfoil, windsurf, SUP, kayak and 30+ other water sports. Record every session on the water and see your speed, distance and track in detail. WIND ALERTS AND FORECASTS • Wind alerts: pick when you want to head out, and Waterspeed tells you when the wind is right, with time to get ready (Pro) • Wind, weather and tide forecasts for the spots near you (Pro) • Wind history and spot conditions (Explore+) MEASURE • Speed, max speed, average speed, distance and duration • Best speeds over 2 s, 10 s and 500 m (Pro) • Your track on the map, with speed shown along the route • Heart rate from your watch, wind, strokes and foiling time • Tacks and gybes analysis, foiling efficiency (Pro) • VMG (velocity made good) and true wind angle (Ultra) • Polar charts and performance against target speeds (Ultra) • Upwind/downwind and port/starboard analysis, legs and runs, gains and losses in distance and angle (Ultra) • Countdown timer for race starts (Pro) • Session history and progress over months and seasons WORKS WITH YOUR DEVICES AND APPS • Apple Watch: record your session right from your wrist • Garmin, Coros, Suunto and Vakaros: your sessions sync into Waterspeed automatically • Strava and GPS-Speedsurfing.com: send your sessions there automatically (Pro) SPORTS Sailing (dinghy, keelboat, catamaran), wingfoil, windsurf, kitesurf, foil, efoil, pumpfoil, SUP, kayak, canoe, downwind, powerboat and 30+ water sports. IMPROVE • Log your gear (boards, sails, wings, foils, boats) and compare sessions • Challenges and leaderboards with the community • Share sessions with friends LIVE SHARING • Live location sharing, so people on shore can follow you (Pro) PLANS Free to download and record. Pro unlocks full stats, history and sync. Ultra adds advanced sailing and racing analysis: VMG, true wind angle, polars, legs and runs. Waterspeed Pro and Ultra are monthly or yearly subscriptions. Payment is charged to your Apple account and renews automatically unless canceled at least 24 hours before the end of the current period. One subscription works on all Apple devices linked to your iCloud account. Waterspeed can export activities to Apple Health. We love hearing from the community: support@waterspeedapp.com Terms of Service: https://www.waterspeedapp.com/terms Privacy Policy: https://www.waterspeedapp.com/privacy
Screenshots
Verdict
Dawn Patrol and Waterspeed Sailing GPS Tracker both sit at 4.6 stars, but that hides the real split: 85% of Waterspeed Sailing GPS Tracker's written reviews are positive against 49% of Dawn Patrol's. Dawn Patrol's advantage is ratings volume (4.2K vs 1.1K). On price, rating, update cadence and ads there is nothing between them.
Scored on Price · Rating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings · Update frequency · Ads · In-app purchases · Monetization · Best chart rank · Devices · Requires iOS
Both are free to download. Dawn Patrol sells 2 in-app purchases, starting at $3.49 per month and Waterspeed Sailing GPS Tracker sells 10 in-app purchases, starting at $2.99 per month. Whichever you choose, the download price is not the number that matters.
On the App Store both sit at effectively the same score — 4.6 for Dawn Patrol against 4.6 for Waterspeed Sailing GPS Tracker. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 4.2K and 1.1K respectively. Written reviews are what separate them: 49% of Dawn Patrol's written reviews are positive against 85% of Waterspeed Sailing GPS Tracker's.
Both ship on a similar rhythm, roughly every 10 days. The most recent releases landed on November 6, 2026 and November 9, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Dawn Patrol | Waterspeed Sailing GPS Tracker |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 4.6 (4.2K ratings) — better | 4.6 (1.1K ratings) |
| Positive reviews | 49.0% of reviews | 84.8% of reviews — better |
| Number of ratings | 4.2K — better | 1.1K |
| Update frequency | Every 10 days | Every 10 days |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | Yes | Yes |
| Monetization | Freemium | Free with in-app purchases |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch | iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch |
| Requires iOS | 16.4 — better | 17.0 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 290 MB | 146 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Dawn Patrol Surf Tracking | Waterspeed Technologies Limited |
Customer experience
Dawn Patrol
Waterspeed Sailing GPS Tracker
Bugs and requests
Dawn Patrol
Reported bugs
4 issues- Apple Watch complications not working properly
- Incorrect wind/tide data displayed
- Sessions not syncing correctly with phone app
- App crashing on newer iOS/watchOS versions
Requested features
4 requests- Add distance paddled metric
- Allow manual editing of recorded waves
- Improve Strava integration
- Provide option to lock app to specific location
Waterspeed Sailing GPS Tracker
Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.
In-app purchases
Dawn Patrol
- Soul Surfer (Monthly)$3.491 Month
- Soul Surfer (Yearly)1 Month trial$27.491 Year
Waterspeed Sailing GPS Tracker
- WS Monthly subscription14 Days trial$2.991 Month
- Monthly14 Days trial$2.991 Month
- Monthly Subscription14 Days trial$3.991 Month
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- WS Quarterly subscription14 Days trial$7.993 Months
- Waterspeed Ultra Monthly1 Month trial$9.991 Month
- Waterspeed Ultra Monthly$19.991 Month
- WS Yearly subscription14 Days trial$29.991 Year
- Yearly Subscription14 Days trial$29.991 Year
- Waterspeed Ultra Yearly1 Month trial$99.001 Year
- Waterspeed Ultra Yearly14 Days trial$199.001 Year
Questions
Is Dawn Patrol free?
Is Waterspeed Sailing GPS Tracker free?
Which has better reviews, Dawn Patrol or Waterspeed Sailing GPS Tracker?
Do Dawn Patrol or Waterspeed Sailing GPS Tracker have ads?
Which is updated more often, Dawn Patrol or Waterspeed Sailing GPS Tracker?
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