Wavve Boating vs Tide Watcher
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Wavve Boating
Navigate waterways with detailed nautical charts, tide predictions, and weather forecasts. Connect with a community of boaters to share points of interest and track friends on the water. Enjoy simplified GPS navigation tailored to your boat's draft.
- Simple GPS navigation
- Customizable nautical charts
- Community points of interest
- Tide predictions
- 7-day weather forecasts
- Friend tracking (Fleets)
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Ever have a stressful day navigating on the water? Wanted to know more about the conditions you are about to head into? Are you looking for exciting places to explore, the best place to refuel, or just trying to meet up with a friend? Wavve Boating takes a new spin on traditional boating navigation by bringing detailed nautical charts, tide predictions, weather forecasts, and more in one easy-to-use tool. Join a fast-growing community of boaters building a network of marine knowledge that everyone can enjoy. With Wavve Boating you get: - Simple and Seamless Marine GPS Navigation - Put away overcrowded and complex charts and apps. Wavve Boating's GPS focuses on important and relevant information so that navigating is as easy as staying in the blue and avoiding the red. - Custom Nautical Charts - View and change Wavve Boating's nautical charts based on your unique boating needs and preferences. Set your draft and Wavve Boating redraws the nautical charts to fit your boat. Nautical charts are available for the USA, Canada, Australia and the UK. You can view a map of our coverage on our website. - Community Boating - Just like at the dock or on the water, we all help each other in Wavve Boating. Share expert knowledge of the local waterways by adding shared points of interest to the map. The community can vote on pins, making sure they are all valid and valuable. Not quite ready to share a great find? No problem, you can keep your points of interest private as well. - Tides - Track changes in water height in tidal regions and along rivers and lakes with the tides function. View a body of water in North America, and the app will update to reflect the current water levels. View predicted water heights up to 18 hours in advance and track the next tidal variances. - Weather - Check the weather, including a complete seven-day forecast, across all of North America. Easily view the temperature, wind speed, and wave height as you move around the map. The local daily forecasts are color-coded to show if it is dangerous to go boating, using guidelines from the Coast Guard's small vessel advisory. - Fleets of Friends - See who is on the water and where they are by adding friends to your fleet. Share your locations with members of your fleet to make meeting up a breeze. Want to keep your best fishing hole a secret, even from your boating buds? Easily hide your location to boat under the radar. - So Long Chart Plotters - Marine navigation is more than concentrating on a cluttered chart plotter. Get your head out of the cabin and enjoy the journey. Stop buying marine charts piece by piece for your chart plotter. Wavve Boating has integrated all the marine charts into one map for your boating GPS needs. Subscription Pricing and Terms Wavve Boating is free to download, and all customers are welcome to a free 14 day trial period. Should you choose to continue to use the Wavve Boating app after the free trial, we offer two auto-renewing subscription options, monthly ($11.99/month) or yearly ($69.99/year). Wavve Boating needs you! We've built the platform, but it is boaters that will build our Wavver community. Share your knowledge, share your time, and save a prop or two in the process. MORE INFORMATION Want to learn more about Wavve Boating’s marine navigation aid? Still deciding if this is the right boat GPS app for you to replace your chart plotter? Looking for an alternative to Navionics, Embark, Garmin Active Captain or other? Head to our website to learn more. TERMS OF SERVICE https://wavveboating.com/terms-of-service/ PRIVACY POLICY https://wavveboating.com/privacy-policy/
Tide Watcher
This app provides tide tracking for coastal boating and marine exploration. It offers an easy-to-use interface for accessing tide information.
- Tide tracking
- Coastal boating information
- Marine exploration data
- Easy-to-use interface
- App Store best tide tracker
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Welcome to the future of coastal boating and marine exploration. Tide Watcher is the easiest and best tide tracker on the App Store!
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is review sentiment: Tide Watcher at 100% against Wavve Boating's 52%. Tide Watcher also leads on in-app purchases (none vs 5) and rating (5.0 vs 4.7). Wavve Boating's advantage is ads (none vs shown) and ratings volume (6.6K vs 5). On price, update cadence and device support 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. Wavve Boating sells 5 in-app purchases, starting at $9.99 per month. Tide Watcher asks for nothing beyond the download.
Tide Watcher holds the better App Store score, 5.0 against 4.7. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Wavve Boating has 6.6K ratings behind it against 5, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews point the same way: 52% of Wavve Boating's written reviews are positive against 100% of Tide Watcher's.
Wavve Boating ships an update weekly, Tide Watcher every 5 days. The most recent releases landed on October 26, 2026 and October 14, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Wavve Boating | Tide Watcher |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 4.7 (6.6K ratings) | 5.0 (5 ratings) — better |
| Positive reviews | 51.7% of reviews | 100.0% of reviews — better |
| Number of ratings | 6.6K — better | 5 |
| Update frequency | Weekly | Every 5 days — better |
| Ads | No — better | Yes |
| In-app purchases | Yes | No — better |
| Monetization | Free with in-app purchases | Ad-supported — better |
| Best chart rank | #27 — better | — |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch | iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch |
| Requires iOS | 16.0 — better | 18.2 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 201 MB | 33 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Wavve Boating INC | Whitaker Bennett |
Customer experience
Wavve Boating
Tide Watcher
Bugs and requests
Wavve Boating
Reported bugs
3 issues- App crashes when accessing depth data
- Logged out unexpectedly, unable to log back in
- Subscription charges despite cancellation
Requested features
5 requests- Add more inland lake and river coverage
- Improve auto-routing capabilities
- Allow editing of saved routes
- Integrate with more boat displays
- Add social features to share trips with friends
Tide Watcher
Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.
In-app purchases
Wavve Boating
- Monthly Subscription (No Data)$9.991 Month
- Monthly Subscription$11.991 Month
- Best Value - Wavve Boating14 Days trial$69.991 Year
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- Yearly Subscription (No Data)14 Days trial$69.991 Year
- Best Value - Wavve Boating1 Month trial$69.991 Year
Tide Watcher
No in-app purchases









