Introducing Rerouting for Sail Routes

April 4, 2024 • 2 min read

A new approach to navigation for sailboats

Sailing is a complex activity – and finding the best way to your destination is not trivial. You must consider the weather conditions, your crew, your boat's performance, and your preferences.

Last year, Orca introduced Sail Routes. Since then, it has received widespread recognition and praise from media including Europe’s largest boating magazine. Sail Routing is a fantastic planning tool, but until now, it has only been a planning tool.

Weather conditions often change, and changing conditions means you’ll need to update your plans. It’s also common for sailors to deviate from a planned route – often tacking and gybing sooner or later than planned. These deviations accumulate throughout your trip, making your planned route less representative the further you sail along your route.

Orca is changing that with Automatic Rerouting for Sail Routes.

Smarter Sailing

This week’s update introduces Automatic Rerouting for Sail Routes, a fundamentally new approach to sailing at sea.

Before this update, Orca did not adapt Sail Routes to your sailing progress and didn’t act when you deviated from your route. Automatic Rerouting changes this: Orca now monitors your sailing progress and updates the route when it detects that you have deviated from your route or that the weather forecast has changed.

In the example above, Automatic Rerouting notices that the boat has tacked ahead of the planned tack point, and updates the route to follow the new tack.

When the new route gets updated, Orca checks for potential weather changes and re-adjusts your ETA. Orca is also incredibly smart about how it updates your route and only changes relevant parts of the route as you progress. If a larger change is recommended because of a significant weather change, you'll be notified and asked to accept the new route.

Orca Core powers many of the advanced features in Orca.

Automatic Rerouting activates in many situations – including weather forecast changes, and when you deviate from the planned route. Automatic Rerouting also activates on tacks and gybes. The system uses the Orca Core's sailing processor to identify when your boat has reached a stable tack before it triggers an update – so for the best sailing experience, you should get an Orca Core.

The future of Sail Routes

The underlying technology that powers Sail Routes is incredibly powerful. Soon, real-time wind data from your boat will be added to the Sail Route system, making routes even more accurate.

You’ll need an active subscription to access Automatic Rerouting. For tack and gybe detection, you'll also need an Orca Core. Wondering how Orca would fit into your boat and want a personal recommendation?

Check out the guide below!