Website of the Week: predictwind


Hey. This page is more than 5 years old! The content here is probably outdated, so bear that in mind. If this post is part of a series, there may be a more recent post that supersedes this one.

I bought a sailing dinghy.

For wind forecasts, I used to go on:

  • walking down to the beach and seeing if it was windy. Rather too immediate – not really a forecast, per se. Right?
  • the New Zealand MetService recreational marine forecast: A chatterbox compared to the BBC Radio shipping forecast but a little unimaginative.
  • the feeling in my Viking bones.

The lady who sold me my dinghy recommended predictwind.com (also Android and iOS phone apps). Its been good so far.

Paid Option

I am just using the free version. I just get wind, but the paid version(s) look kind of cool.

Weathering routing intriguing: the best route from A to B, using predicted winds. That’s part of the paid product though and without ownership of an ocean-going yacht, it would put me in real armchair weatherman territory.

My boat (the limp one) on the boat I’d probably need to justify paying for predictwind