{"id":1722830,"date":"2026-11-12T07:40:40","date_gmt":"2026-11-12T06:40:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.toernfinder.de\/?p=1722830"},"modified":"2026-11-12T07:40:40","modified_gmt":"2026-11-12T06:40:40","slug":"how-fast-is-a-sailboat","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.toernfinder.de\/en\/segelmagazin\/wie-schnell-segelboot\/","title":{"rendered":"How fast is a sailing boat? Knots, km\/h and hull speed"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>How fast is a sailing boat? A typical cruising yacht usually sails at 5 to 8 knots, which is around 9 to 15 km\/h. Foiling racing boats, on the other hand, can top 100 km\/h. Hull speed and the latest records show why (as of November 2026).<\/p>\n<h2>The essentials at a glance<\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>A cruising yacht with a waterline length of 8 to 12 m is a displacement boat, meaning its hull sits in the water rather than planing, and reaches at most around 7 to 8.5 knots, or 13 to 16 km\/h.<\/li>\n<li>Rule of thumb for hull speed: 2.43 times the square root of the waterline length in metres gives the speed in knots.<\/li>\n<li>Over a long distance the average is lower: if you sail at 6 knots, you cover about 144 nautical miles in 24 hours.<\/li>\n<li>The world record over 500 m stands at 65.45 knots (121 km\/h), set in 2012 by Vestas Sailrocket 2 in Namibia.<\/li>\n<li>The fastest non-stop circumnavigation with crew in the Troph\u00e9e Jules Verne was achieved in 2026 by the trimaran Sodebo Ultim 3 in 40 days, 10 hours and 45 minutes.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2>How fast is a sailing boat on a normal sailing trip?<\/h2>\n<p>On a cruising trip, a sailing yacht's speed is usually between 5 and 8 knots. One knot is one nautical mile per hour, or 1.852 km\/h. You can find out how to convert knots quickly in your head in our article <a href=\"\/en\/sailing-magazine\/knots-to-kmh\/\">Converting knots to km\/h<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>For most cruising yachts, the upper limit is set by hull speed. It depends almost entirely on the waterline length, that is, the length of hull that sits in the water. This is usually somewhat shorter than the length overall. Averaged over day and night you will be slower, because the wind drops or shifts, or because you reef.<\/p>\n<h2>What is hull speed and how do you calculate it?<\/h2>\n<p>Hull speed is the speed at which the wave created by a displacement hull is exactly as long as its waterline. For a yacht, you calculate it like this: <strong>Hull speed in knots = 2.43 \u00d7 \u221a(waterline in m)<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p>It comes down to wave physics. As a hull moves through the water, it creates a wave that travels at roughly the same speed as the boat. The faster the wave, the longer it is. At hull speed, one wave crest sits at the bow and the next at the stern. If the boat goes faster, that second crest moves behind the stern. The stern sinks into the wave trough, the bow rises, and water resistance increases sharply. More sail area then adds hardly any extra speed.<\/p>\n<p>The formula comes from naval architecture theory, which goes back to the Englishman William Froude in the 19th century. In English textbooks it appears as 1.34 \u00d7 \u221a(waterline in feet). If you convert the feet to metres, you get the factor 2.43. The <a href=\"https:\/\/www.usna.edu\/NAOE\/_files\/documents\/Courses\/EN400\/02.07%20Chapter%207.pdf\">derivation in the textbook chapter of the US Naval Academy<\/a> expressly describes it as a rule of thumb.<\/p>\n<h3>Hull speed: examples for cruising yachts<\/h3>\n<table>\n<thead>\n<tr>\n<th>Wasserlinie<\/th>\n<th>Rumpfgeschwindigkeit<\/th>\n<th>in km\/h<\/th>\n<\/tr>\n<\/thead>\n<tbody>\n<tr>\n<td>8 m<\/td>\n<td>6.9 kn<\/td>\n<td>12.7 km\/h<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td>10 m<\/td>\n<td>7.7 kn<\/td>\n<td>14.2 km\/h<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td>12 m<\/td>\n<td>8.4 kn<\/td>\n<td>15.6 km\/h<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td>15 m<\/td>\n<td>9.4 kn<\/td>\n<td>17.4 km\/h<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<p>The values are calculated using the rule of thumb and rounded. They show why a longer boat of the same hull type is faster: doubling the waterline does not double the speed, but adds only around 40 per cent.<\/p>\n<h3>Where the formula reaches its limits<\/h3>\n<p>Hull speed is not a fixed wall. A displacement hull can briefly exceed it, for example when surfing down a wave while running downwind. The waterline can also change while sailing: when the boat heels, the overhangs at the bow and stern of some hulls can dip into the water and lengthen it slightly.<\/p>\n<p>In shallow water, resistance rises sooner, and the boat then becomes slower with the same sail area. And the formula does not apply at all to light boats that plane or fly on foils.<\/p>\n<h2>Why are dinghies, foilers and catamarans faster?<\/h2>\n<p>Light boats overcome the bow wave instead of being trapped in it. They plane on top of the water or lift off entirely on foils, which removes a large part of the wave resistance.<\/p>\n<p>On a <strong>Planing<\/strong> the hull pushes itself up onto its own bow wave, given enough wind and little weight. Typical planing boats are dinghies, sportsboats and modern racing yachts. Just before getting up on the plane, the bow rises steeply, after which the boat becomes noticeably faster. A heavy cruising yacht with a ballast keel usually has too much weight for this.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Foilers<\/strong> stand on foils beneath the hull. Above a certain speed, they lift the hull out of the water, and only the narrow wings and the helm remain submerged. As early as 2009, the foiling trimaran Hydropt\u00e8re reached 51.36 knots, around 95 km\/h, over 500 m.<\/p>\n<h3>How fast does a catamaran sail?<\/h3>\n<p>A racing catamaran with foils travels at over 100 km\/h, whereas a cruising catamaran with cabins, tanks and a dinghy is a cruising boat and considerably slower. You can read about how catamarans and monohull yachts differ in speed, space and upwind performance in <a href=\"\/en\/sailing-magazine\/catamaran-or-monohull-pros-and-cons-compared\/\">Catamaran or monohull<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>An example with a German connection: off Sassnitz on R\u00fcgen, the French team set the speed record of the SailGP racing series in August 2026 on its foiling F50 catamaran, with 107.63 km\/h, around 58 knots.<\/p>\n<h2>What is the fastest sailing boat in the world?<\/h2>\n<p>The fastest sailing boat in the world is Vestas Sailrocket 2. In 2012, Paul Larsen sailed it off Walvis Bay in Namibia at an average of 65.45 knots over 500 m, or around 121 km\/h. This world record still stands today.<\/p>\n<p>Such records are ratified by the World Sailing Speed Record Council, which World Sailing founded in 1972. What is measured is not the peak speed but the average over a fixed distance. The <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sailspeedrecords.com\/records\">official record list<\/a> covers not only the 500 m but also the nautical mile, 24 hours and many offshore routes.<\/p>\n<table>\n<thead>\n<tr>\n<th>Record<\/th>\n<th>Boat, year<\/th>\n<th>Value<\/th>\n<\/tr>\n<\/thead>\n<tbody>\n<tr>\n<td>500 m<\/td>\n<td>Vestas Sailrocket 2, 2012<\/td>\n<td>65.45 kn (121 km\/h)<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td>1 nautical mile<\/td>\n<td>Vestas Sailrocket 2, 2012<\/td>\n<td>55.32 kn (102 km\/h)<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td>24 hours<\/td>\n<td>Trimaran Banque Populaire 5, 2009<\/td>\n<td>908.2 nm, average 37.84 kn<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<h3>How fast do boats sail around the world?<\/h3>\n<p>So far, the fastest circumnavigation has taken just over 40 days. Skipper Thomas Coville and his crew, seven sailors in all, set off aboard the trimaran Sodebo Ultim 3 on 15 December 2025 from Ouessant in Brittany and returned on 25 January 2026. Their official time for the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.tropheejulesverne.org\/en\/?p=5248\">Troph\u00e9e Jules Verne<\/a>, the non-stop circumnavigation with crew: 40 days, 10 hours, 45 minutes and 50 seconds.<\/p>\n<p>They sailed 28,315 nautical miles at an average of 29.17 knots, or around 54 km\/h, day and night for about six weeks. This time is not yet in the World Sailing Speed Record Council's record list. How fast the big trimarans sail across the Atlantic single-handed is shown in our article on the <a href=\"\/en\/sailing-magazine\/route-du-rhum-2026-start\/\">Route du Rhum 2026<\/a>.<\/p>\n<h2>How many nautical miles can a sailing boat cover in a day?<\/h2>\n<p>On long passages, a cruising yacht usually covers 130 to 150 nautical miles in 24 hours, or a little more. The distance sailed in 24 hours is called the day's run (Etmal).<\/p>\n<p>It's simple to work out: average speed times 24. At 5 knots that is 120 nautical miles, at 6 knots 144. How long a nautical mile is and why it measures exactly 1,852 m is explained in our article on the <a href=\"\/en\/sailing-magazine\/nautical-mile\/\">nautical mile<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>A real-world benchmark is the <a href=\"\/en\/cabin-charter-atlantic-crossing\/\">an Atlantic crossing<\/a> of cruising yachts from Gran Canaria to Saint Lucia in the Caribbean. The route is around 2,700 nautical miles, and most boats take 18 to 21 days. Calculated on the course distance, that corresponds to a day's run of at least about 130 to 150 nautical miles and an average of just over 5 to just over 6 knots. On coastal sailing trips, by contrast, you only sail for part of the day, so the time spent on the day's leg matters more than the day's run.<\/p>\n<h2>Frequently asked questions<\/h2>\n<h3>How fast is a sailing boat in km\/h?<\/h3>\n<p>A cruising yacht usually sails at 9 to 15 km\/h (5 to 8 knots). Dinghies and sports boats can be considerably faster when planing, and foiling racing boats can exceed 100 km\/h.<\/p>\n<h3>How do I calculate hull speed?<\/h3>\n<p>Take the square root of the waterline length in metres and multiply it by 2.43. With a 10 m waterline, that gives around 7.7 knots or 14.2 km\/h.<\/p>\n<h3>What is the fastest sailing boat in the world?<\/h3>\n<p>Vestas Sailrocket 2 at 65.45 knots (121 km\/h) over 500 m, sailed in Namibia in 2012. The record has still not been beaten.<\/p>\n<h2>Sail long passages yourself<\/h2>\n<p>You only find out what a day's run of 140 nautical miles feels like at sea. On T\u00f6rnfinder you will find <a href=\"\/en\/mile-building\/\">Mile building<\/a>, where you sail day and night, stand watches and cover long distances with the crew.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A cruising yacht usually sails at 5 to 8 knots, or roughly 9 to 15 km\/h. Find out how to calculate a yacht's hull speed, why foilers can reach over 100 km\/h and which records stand.<\/p>","protected":false},"author":67,"featured_media":1722779,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_tf_mag_toernhinweis":"meilentoern","footnotes":""},"categories":[541],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1722830","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-boote-technik","category-541","description-off"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.toernfinder.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1722830","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.toernfinder.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.toernfinder.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.toernfinder.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/67"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.toernfinder.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1722830"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.toernfinder.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1722830\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1722833,"href":"https:\/\/www.toernfinder.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1722830\/revisions\/1722833"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.toernfinder.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1722779"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.toernfinder.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1722830"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.toernfinder.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1722830"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.toernfinder.de\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1722830"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}