AIS Fleet shows the latest reported positions of ships and boats, and sends notices when it detects a vessel you follow departing or arriving. You can watch a favourite ferry, follow a cruise ship, or explore the traffic around a harbour.
You do not need a boat of your own, and there is nothing to install. Sign in at aisfleet.com with your e-mail address, search for the vessel by name, and press Follow. Following five vessels is free, and the free plan does not expire.
Watch your first vessel in about a minute
- Go to aisfleet.com and type your e-mail address.
- A six-digit code arrives by e-mail. Type it in. There is no password to choose or remember.
- Search for a vessel by name, and open her panel.
- Press Follow.
The vessel joins your map and Favorites list, with departure and arrival notices enabled. Notices depend on the reports we receive, so they can be delayed or missed where coverage is limited. Follow your first vessel walks through the steps and helps if the code or vessel does not appear.
Get the app
There is also an iPhone app on the App Store. Use the same account to watch vessels on your phone. AIS Fleet on your phone covers installation, notifications and the features that still use the website.
What you get
- A live map of the AIS traffic our network has heard, coloured by what kind of vessel each one is, with her speed, her course, her flag and where she has been.
- A notice when a vessel you follow gets under way, saying where she left from, and another when she arrives, saying where she arrived. In the app, by e-mail, or both, set boat by boat.
- Search by name, and by MMSI, call sign or IMO number when you want one particular vessel.
- Photographs of vessels, taken and contributed by other members, and a way to add your own.
- Lists, so the boats you follow can be sorted the way a playlist sorts songs, and shared with other members if you want.
The guide explains the marine terms as you meet them. The map shows the vessels reported to our network; coverage varies by location.
Who uses it
- You watch ships. Open the map, filter by vessel type, tap anything you can see, and search for one particular vessel when you want it. Reading the vessel map
- Someone you love is on a cruise. Follow the ship by name, and you hear as she leaves each port and again as she reaches the next one. Departures and arrivals
- Someone you love is at sea for work. A training ship, a research vessel, a working ferry: the same notices, and an explanation of the long quiet stretches. Watching someone who is aboard
- You photograph vessels. Follow the ones you want to photograph, use the departure notice to know when one leaves, and add your photographs to the shared catalog. Vessel photos
- You curate. Sort what you follow into lists, with a note on each, and share a list so other members can subscribe to it. Lists
- You own a boat. If her AIS reports reach our network, she may appear here without an account. Your boat on AIS Fleet explains what people can see and which sharing choices are yours.
The aisfleet.com home page gives a short overview of the features and plans. For the full explanations, choose User guide under the feature overview or at the foot of the page. The guide is also linked from the sign-in screen and account menu.
What it is not
The map is not a complete picture of the sea. AIS Fleet draws the vessels reported to its network, and radio does not reach everywhere. Where the positions come from explains coverage and how to read the age of a position.
There is no arrivals board, and AIS Fleet does not predict arrival times: the ETA on a vessel's panel is the one her crew entered. Following a vessel is what brings you notices about her: when she departs or arrives, and, once your own boat is linked, when she comes within a distance you choose of your boat.
What it costs
Following five vessels is free, on a plan that is not a trial and does not expire. The map, the search, the departures and arrivals, the photos, the messages and your own AIS receiver work the same on it as on any plan. Paid plans let you follow more vessels, keep more lists, see a longer track behind each boat and connect an AI assistant. Plans and billing has the table.
Account settings and deletion
Your account and privacy explains your display name, who can see your activity and how to close your account. If you subscribed through Apple, cancel that subscription in your Apple account before deleting your AIS Fleet account.
Who makes it
AIS Fleet is made by the team behind Saillogger, the automatic logbook boaters use for their own voyages. It is a separate site with a separate account, and you need no Saillogger account to use anything here.
That connection shows up in one place: a few of the boats on the chart keep their logbook with Saillogger, and when a boat's owner chooses to share it, her panel carries more than AIS broadcasts. Boats that log with Saillogger explains what that panel carries and why. Everything else works whether or not you use Saillogger.