Anchor Pro Reviews

The Anchor Pro application has several interesting features and modes in which to set the anchor position: Current Position, Relative, or Absolute Coordinates. Did not test Current Position mode. However, either due to GPS errors or underlying software error, Relative and Absolute Coordinate modes to not work well as if there is geometry rotation error or worse, no filtering of position, velocity, heading and GPS DOPs. This results in repetitive false alarms and need to continually increase the allowable anchor distance to unacceptable values and erroneous tracks. In several cases Anchor Pro position track was well forward over my 120 anchor rode length and anchor location while in 23 knots of wind. Note that the IPhone placed in unobstructed clear sky. this app reported GPS accuracy of 13 to 20 feet.

In my test case, anchored on catamaran in 25 knots with cross swell and tide. The yaw rotation as well as swing causes havoc with this app positioning and short baseline position calculations.

Comparing tracks and actual anchor position if my B&G Zeus system chart plotter vs Anchor Pro makes the error in Anchor Pro obvious. Screen caps of tracks of B&G vs this app sent to the developer - ideaboys

Promising but needs better positioning and filtering algorithm. Doesn’t appear to have an update in 8 months. Hope IdeaBoys addresses this otherwise useless to me.

It’s working great but every other day it has glitches all of a sudden it shows that the boat is 300 or 700 feet away from the anchor. The GPS tracking sometimes work, and other times doesn’t. And while our general position doesn’t change (for example we are surrounded by 3 boats and our general distance in relationship to those boats doesn’t change), according ding to AnchorPro we end up 130+ feet away from the original location.

AnchorPro does what it’s designed for and does it well. I used it in 14-18mph winds and a high tidal flow area so the boat had a 180 degree swing. As I monitored our position on multiple devices AnchorPro was relatively accurate ( iOS gps accuracy could be better) . The interface is very intuitive and straight forward. All in all great job sloth

Suggestions : 1-provide an icon to increase / decrease radius or maybe allow user to drop anchor and then have a settling period where you monitor the speed and drift to determine anchor heading along with rode deployed
2- allow anchor review input , maybe ask for specific info like protection , bottom holding , need wash down , etc and link to active captain account to feed reviews. You could also pull anchorage info from AC and provide a richer Experince to users
3- with tracking of boat movement allow changing the track color , the current color is hard to see in certain lighting
4- Scan WiFi connection for nema2000 GPS and allow to switch to it as primary GPS for higher accuracy. Maybe even have redundancy and intelligence to validate on device against another ( I have two GPS on the boat , one for ais, one for navigation + the iOS device )

—————update—————
Thanks for contacting me ... look forward to seeing the enhancements

I’ve been using AnchorPro for 3 seasons, coastal cruising on a 34’ sailboat. It works decently well.

Last night I had my drag radius set for 225’ to give the anchor a little time to reset because I had plenty of space. Anchor alarm went off after a 180deg swing reversal but did not go off for over 700’ putting us almost on another boat. Maybe it was user error, but this incident made me question AnchorPro .

This works very well, the paid version is well worth the subscription. Downside is you better make sure the alarm volume is up before you rely on it for night time use. App volume is not the same as ringer volume. App hasn’t had an update in 2 years so there may be better out there by now.

This is a wonderful app and does everything it NEEDS to do. Easy to set, good alarm and great that can send you a message on another device if you drag. My wishes as someone else stated it can sometimes lose your signal which might more be the device and not AnchorPro but what I would really love it the ability to change my boat icon. A blue circle in the middle of my blue line swing pattern can be hard to see. Especially when trying to monitor the anchor at night. If we could change the icon to a different color or a different sized shape that would be very helpful!! Will continue to use and pay for pro regardless as it’s a great app!

I really like AnchorPro and I purchased the full version. My only complaint is that the circular (or semi-circular) field you set around your anchor is inconsistent on the map view when you zoom in. Part of the border disappears and you cannot see (graphically) how close to your border you are. Seems like a bug in the zoom function.

Sailed in here with 25 to 30 knt winds out of the NW
Serious blow. On the anchor with the riding sail up
Sloop rig 40’, stretched out in my bunk relaxed and know if a gust blows us off the anchor set AnchorPro will let me know. So, yes, I am relaxed. Thanks to Anchor Pro. And I don’t have the high end one. Might think about that now.

I love this program. It works as advertised and we sleep much better knowing exactly how our sailboat is laying at anchor, especially during gales, like the one we experienced last week. I also use Telegram to keep an eye on our sailboat while we are away.

My family and I have been cruising the oceans aboard our sailboat for three years. I started using Anchor Pro about two years ago. It is an awesome app. I always have it on. Be sure to check out the advance features on setting up distance and using satellite overlay on the map page to see the reefs and bommies.

I was anchored in a very tenuous situation with an overheating engine. I couldn't move til morning. I was going to stay up all night as a precaution but my buddy told me to use AnchorPro. I downloaded it and set the parameters. When tide came in and we were moving I was alerted and woke up fresh and alert. I was ready to deal with the problem!

I upgraded to the paid version so that I could see the “track” of the boat on the map. But it appears this only works when I have a WiFi or cell connection, making it useless in many locations. Can this be my error? Otherwise, great app.

Other suggestions: gps updating every second or more is overkill- does this affect power usage? Can it be adjusted ? I would prefer every 10 seconds if, for example, this cut power draw by 30%.

Seeing water depths (like on any chart) on the same map would be cool (although understandably a lot of work to implement for a non-necessity)

I second the request to use a NEMA gps antenna as source.

I have been on a mooring in Catalina which has bow and stern pickups so needless to say the boat stays in one place. I set my alarm with a 60 foot radius. The alarm went off three times during the night and we had not moved. It seems the accuracy of the gps is not very precise compared to other devices. This needs to be taken into account when setting distance. Due to this you will need to set your radius further than most would like diminishing the whole premise of AnchorPro . ALSO the feature in which you can reset the position of the anchor by dragging it on the map (which is a great idea) does not work on my devise which is an iPhone. Otherwise I think the ease of use and design is great.

I have been using Anchor for several years. We own a cruiser and anchor in all different conditions in fresh and salt water. Anchor has saved us from drifting into the trees at the lake and also from drifting into a 70’ yacht in the channel. It’s worth the $5/year price tag for the pro version because I can leave my phone on the boat and it will message my wife’s phone if the anchor starts dragging. Excellent app!

We were on a mooring ball and I set the alarm anyway. It went off at 4 am I looked out and thought the wind had shifted us out of the preset swing. I laid down but did not go to sleep. I felt something was wrong and got up to find us 100 feet from some rocks. The mooring ball was still tied to the boat. If the alarm had not gone off we would have crashed.

We have been using Anchor Pro for over a year and it has saved us several times when we have dragged (our boat is very heavy), but recently it saved our anchor from being lost as a violent storm sheared the pin on our anchor and a few days later using AnchorPro to find my original pin it led us right to it. Thank you Anchor Pro, we recommend you constantly. Sincerely, Sailing Archers

Set up the alarm on a phone or IPad with GPS. Use WiFi or cell service to send email alert to another iPhone which you will carry with you or a text using telegram. If you don’t have cellular data on the iPhone you carry, no problem, you can set up a rule to forward your email from the ideaboys to your cell#. For Verizon is vztext@yournumber.
If the anchor drags you will get a text.

I have been using AnchorPro since we moved aboard about 2 years ago. I love the improvements especially the ability to use a previous anchor and then view the last 24 hours for the many times I have erroneously shut down the program. I have a much easier time sleeping knowing that this alarm will alert me if we are dragging. I highly recommend this and it even works out of cell range since it works on GPS and not cell or wifi service.

Highly recommend and very affordable.

I love AnchorPro. I have a 45 foot sail— my chart plotters are too far away and act to hear any alarms at night. I leave this plugged in and beside by bed. MAJOR PEACE OF MIND. I find the UI to be incredibly well thought out. It’s nice to have the history page, easy to “return” to a previous alarm. Super super handy If you want to stop use by day, say you go off in dingy and can’t have alarm on, and once you return, you can easily re-enable.

I actually recently tried the send email if alarm feature. Emailed myself. The left my phone on the boat and hiked around an island with only my Apple watch. Fortunately, no emails... that I was dragging. ;-)

The developer deserves kudos! Thank you.

As full time live aboard cruisers we wanted something to alert us of movement when we went ashore or anytime we left the boat. AnchorPro has been Fantastic with the dual alert system and spot on for boat movements. Love AnchorPro and use it daily.