Gear: Lowrance: Fishing & Navigation

The app, available for both Apple and Android-based handheld devices, uses C-MAP charts for its plotter-based functions.

The app’s point of difference? Access to basic maps – the most valuable part of any navigation software to boaters on a budget of nothing – is free once you sign up for a Lowrance account.

If you want more, you’ll need to pay for it. For $70.99 a year, Lowrance will allow you to unlock the software to add a number of extra features, including more detailed maps with depth shading, automatic route planning and showing the device’s exact position rather than what appears to be a 20-kilometre radius.

The app will also act as an automatic identification system, showing the position of your vessel to other app users.

Subscribers can also mark fishing hotspots and other points of interest on their handheld device at home, and then upload them to a compatible Lowrance multifunction screen. It also works the other way, with recorded trips transferred to the smartphone or tablet for future reference.

It will also allow users to plot a route and check on the estimated arrival time, and can overlay observed and expected weather and wind data to show how the day will change out on the water.

It even has a map download function if you happen to be heading anywhere outside mobile phone range.

Devices that are compatible with the app include:

Lowrance: Fishing & Navigation is available via the Apple App Store or Android’s Google Play Store.