YachtWorld Reviews

I wouldn’t be so harsh if this app didn’t have a de facto monopoly on the used sailboat market. YachtWorld has one simple job: show a list of products, show details and pictures of individual products when clicked on, and most importantly - keep track of where the user was in the list when going back to the list. Instead we get pushed back to the top of the list every time because the developers can’t solve this monumental conundrum of computing? My peeps just store and update one variable representing the highest seen boat while scrolling and keep track of it, then show me that place in the list whenever I go back. If that’s too much, then when I’m viewing a specific boat and hit back to go to the list, at least put me at the place in the list where that specific boat is instead of the top. Also the filters don’t match the website (website is by region whereas app is by state). Pictures often don’t display correctly. Often I get “no results” for a search even though the blue button after setting filters says there will be results. Change one filter, search, change it back, search, and suddenly I now have results. Just pure untested jank.

I used to love YachtWorld but it’s started crashing like every five minutes. Also there are some really annoying bugs like every time you go to another app and reopen it it automatically scrolls to the top of the list of boats you were looking at so you have to go back and spend five minutes finding your place again any time you want to answer a text. Also there is no year listed once you click on a boat. When you’re looking at the list it shows a year, but once you click on a particular boat there is nowhere where it says the year, so you try to go back into the list to see the year and then half the time it auto scrolls all the way back to the top of the list. And then you’re halfway to finding the boat you were looking at again and YachtWorld crashes. Crazy annoying.

Latest iPhone with latest version of iOS installed. Can browse for about 5-10min and then photos stop loading on boats making YachtWorld virtually unusable. In the few min it does work when I open it the ux is horrendous - close button sometimes doesn’t appear when browsing + downward swipe to close fails. Website is not much better and listings often don’t load / photos stop loading. It’s incredible that Boats Group / Apax Partners is not maintaining / upgrading YachtWorld to modern standards with their market share and revenues. I’m sure if they sit on their cash a little longer without re-investing, something better will come along. Brokers would love to jump ship and I’m sure I’m not the only frustrated buyer.

Update:

They have updated the search functionality, so that it’s now not a software bug, but just not an option at all. So... worse. You can now not even put in a location anymore regardless of screen size. It’s not an option. You can only search within a distance of your current location. So, whereas it was unusable on smaller phones due to a bug, it is now unusable for everyone who wants to browse boats that are not near where they live.

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Original Review:

Seems fine when you first open it, but if you want to search by any location that isn’t your Current Location, you are completely unable. It the keyboard completely covers the drop down for selecting your country with no way to scroll down to see it. If that’s your use-case, just use the web app. It’s far superior.

It got 2 stars rather than 1 because it seems like this might not be an issue on larger phones. Also, the saved searches seem useful, but only if I can actually search for what I want.

I wish you could filter out certain things. Such as time share boats / fractional ownership or other items not interested in. Also some listings are really vague or have limited information about the boat they wish to sell. This is a loss to those trying to sell and not a fault to the developer. But what if the the developer could add fields to help encourage customers to add more data about there boats at the time they write up their ads (something to get better info). It seems weird that someone who wants to sell an expensive yacht but doesn’t make the effort to add as much detail as possible.

Update: Dropping to 1 star. Perhaps not the fault of YachtWorld but I emailed Lelievre / Alize Marine from within YachtWorld . Shortly after i started getting really bad spam. I never ever had spam mail on that email before. I also never got a reply from that marine company either. Not sure why they would post an add with pictures that were clearly not the pictures of that boat or older pics. The description said the boat was hurricane damaged but the pictures were of a new boat. If i am wrong let me know and i will either update or delete my review.

This new update YachtWorld has preformed has ruined YachtWorld . Looking up boats has gotten way harder. I can’t name one good thing that has come from this update before I would have given YachtWorld a 4.5 out of 5 now I would give it 0.5 out of 5 it’s awful to use and so is the website. I feel the developers from YachtWorld should reconsider and go back to the old version. The problems start from its removing most of my boats saved from the previous app to looking for boats the filter/sort is awful and one glitchy button later you restart your search process. If the developers from the apps see this please go back to the other version. Awful update

I have a recent iPhone and keep software up to date. YachtWorld is frankly as bad as the website. It crashes all the time; after about 5 minutes of browsing, all listing pictures disappear and you have to completely shut down app and often phone as well to reset them. The video ads of course, always work even when YachtWorld has frozen. Some of the advanced filters on the website are not available on YachtWorld . The interface is functional but kind of clunky and dated. Unless YachtWorld was purpose built to replicate the random frustrations of boat ownership, there is a lot of room for improvement. I don’t know what the parent company’s status is or if they are continuing to make investments in YachtWorld but if they are, both corporate and software developers should take note that YW is no longer the global monopoly they once were and curating brokerage listings in an accessible and clean way is not a particularly difficult programming task.

i’m not sure for how many versions we still need to suffer through the crashes. But every time I click on one of my favorite boats, it just crashes. So click on a liked boat, click on a boat, and crashes. my second grime is with the pictures. Viewing images of boats is terrible. Accidentally, you always click on the picture eventually. Then it blows up a little bit and navigation turns into a nightmare. The pictures are cropped incorrectly and are not shown in the full original size. The loading Times are crazy high, independent of Internet connection quality. I really hope they fix this at some point. The website, even the mobile website, works so much better! I only wish I could login and actually save favorites. But there’s no account option.

YachtWorld has potential, but cannot do it's most essential jobs correctly. It only works in portrait on my iPad, which is in a keyboard case in landscape, so I have to remove it from the case to use. The images load but if you tap on them it will switch the images to landscape, but inexplicably crop the top and bottom off the pictures. Given that the value in an app selling boats is mainly in the pictures and it's handling of them, I can't understand why this simple functionality, show pictures, rotate the device as needed, display the entire image, is a bridge too far for the developers.

Please fix image handling, please allow YachtWorld to rotate. I am typing this review with YachtWorld rotated 90 degrees and me tilting my head to see how many typos I have made. The saving grace for YachtWorld is mainly that compared to the website, which has the single worst image handling I have ever seen on a site specializing in selling million dollar boats, is even worse.

this app has degraded both their website and app over the years making harder and harder to search specific criteria in specific regions. YachtWorld is especially egregious in that in the US you can’t search a region you must search state by state and they’re not even listed in alphabetical order! In the past you could search a region such as Pacific Northwest which included both US and Canadian boats. No more. Worse the selection of search criteria has been dumbed down to general catagories. Oh did I mention the photos that refuse to load?

It seems the system is aimed at people who really don’t know much about boats. Do I use it? Yes but it’s annoying having experienced the older versions which worked far better than they do now.

It starts off fine, but if you’re looking through more than a small amount of bits, it feels like it needs a refresh button, because the pictures I was looking at turn to gray blank pages. Exit out to the next boat only to find 99% of those I haven’t viewed are now grayed out. It feels like YachtWorld is losing its data retention. I’ve tried going back and researching the same content through the filter button but no change. I need to exit YachtWorld and come back. Exiting, swiping up, reopening immediately doesn’t update it. It is frustrating because as others have said, this IS one, if not the most comprehensive list of boats to look at. But if you’re slow with looking, you may lose you’re ability to look altogether.

In the this app app, when I browse through the list of boats and select a specific boat to view its details, there's a frustrating problem when I go back to the main list. Instead of returning to the previous scroll position where I left off, YachtWorld resets the list and starts again from the top. This means I have to scroll all the way back down to find where I left off, which is particularly annoying and time-consuming when dealing with a long list of boats. It disrupts the browsing experience and makes navigation cumbersome.

I’ve been using the this app app and find it to be a fantastic platform for browsing and finding yachts. The interface is user-friendly, and YachtWorld runs smoothly without any major issues. However, there is room for improvement, particularly in the “Interests” section, which corresponds to the “Class” section on the website.
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Currently, the “Interests” section has a limited number of options, and categories like “Sailing Boats” and “Powerboats” lack subcategories. This makes it more challenging to narrow down specific searches. Adding more options and subcategories would significantly enhance the user experience by making searches more precise and tailored to individual needs.
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Additionally, it would be great if YachtWorld included the option to view videos of the boats, similar to what is available on the website. This feature would provide a more comprehensive experience for potential buyers and enthusiasts.
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Overall, it’s an excellent app, but with these adjustments and added features, it could be even better!

Everyone uses this app… pretty much all broker listings, so factor that in to prices you see. If you click on the images it’ll bounce back and forth between the large image and the listing; at least on apple products. It’s annoying but not a big deal. Search features are good for honing into what you’re looking for. For location specific searches (like a specific city), easiest way is to just put that city in the search bar and make sure your other settings are for what you’re looking for (price range, vessel type, make/model, year, etc). All in all, a great way to quickly review hundreds of boats.

The layout and interface are good. This doesn’t seem to have as many boats listed as other apps but this one is easier to search.

I’m still looking for an app that makes it much easier to filter for what I want. I know the specific size, some finishing electronics, motor sizes, and hull I am looking for. Why is there no filter for brackets vs euro transoms? Why are there a million bay boats popping up when I only want an offshore center console? Why can I not dictate that I want twin 200s within a certain year instead of 150s?

Seems like they have improved upon other interfaces, but still have room to grow.

Initially YachtWorld worked great! Within the last week or two the filter hasn’t been working too well and isn’t filtering out other makes and models, let alone saving the latter part of the length. Also would like to be able to narrow search results to multiple US states such as; Alaska, California, Hawaii, Oregon, and Washington instead of just one or all states. In addition, sailboats in my saves/favorites still appear when it appears they may have been sold.

Edit: The very day I posted the above comment the basic filtering was restored to normal. With that I will upgrade to four stars.

I don’t know a better app for browsing the global yacht market however I find YachtWorld itself to be inconsistent. iPad version performs poorly with bad screen layout, unreadable text, and thumbnails off the side of the screen. Doesn’t work in landscape mode which, honestly, is the right way to look at boat hulls. Zoomed photos are unnecessarily and badly cropped, plus the zoom image browser regularly loses the X button to close it so YachtWorld just needs to be cancelled. Landscape also creates problems on iPhone version.

Updating my review: 1 Star now. YachtWorld and website developers have completely crippled advanced search, so it is almost impossible to find specific kinds of boats through their service. And this change has happened since I left my original review. Yeah, the service has actually gotten worse. So I’m deleting it. Too bad.

Original review:

I enjoy YachtWorld for dream shopping, but am a little disappointed in that it doesn't seem to have a full set of Advanced Search options, as compared to the website.

I used the boat trader app exclusively but once I used YachtWorld, I haven’t gone back to boat trader. YachtWorld is not glitchy and I love the way you can constantly scroll down even after swiping through pictures of listings. I would like a mileage radius feature though - unless I’m missing something I can only choose my location, (unknown distance???) or I must choose a single state. Choosing a single state seems silly to me as I’m in the northeast and want to see several states inventory at a time. If these selections exists then I’m missing them or it’s not intuitive- but over all, I do love YachtWorld .

YachtWorld is good but lacks some detail about vessels that is available on this app website. Unfortunately the new American version of the this app website is complete garbage, the filters (especially the geographic filters) are terrible. And among the most annoying things is that you can only view 10 boats per page on the computer website.... App is good though and certainly should be used