Reading the SonarBuddy map
What you're looking at
- Blue shading and dashed contours: the free seabed model (or the official chart in New Zealand). It's a smoothed estimate, often decades old near coasts and reefs.
- White: where boats have actually measured the bottom.
- Black contours: depths drawn from those measurements. Grey contours are estimates in the gaps between nearby tracks; they are never drawn shallower than 5 m.
- Red: boats found less water than the model. Purple: the model shows land or reef, but boats were afloat there. Blue: deeper than the model.
- Tap any spot to see the measured depth (at the lowest tide, LAT), what the model says, and how many boats have confirmed it. One boat means "check this"; several boats agreeing is much stronger.
- Satellite photos (Apple): turn them on in What am I looking at? to see reefs and coral heads under the soundings.
Your boat, live
While you're logging, the map shows your boat from its own GPS and compass, your speed, heading and depth, and your soundings appear behind you as you sail. Only you see them live. Everyone else sees them after the next upload, every 10 minutes when you have internet. The video uses demo data.
The map is a planning aid built from community soundings. It is not for navigation.
← All help articles · Still stuck? Open Help in the app, or email mail@sonarbuddy.com.