Both. Different jobs.
- Use Windy if you sail coastal or day-sail and want a free/cheap multi-model tool. The free tier alone beats most apps' paid tiers.
- Use PredictWind if you do offshore passages, need routing against your boat's polars, or take GRIBs over satellite. The routing is best-in-class.
- Most cruisers run both. Windy daily for awareness, PredictWind the night before a passage. Under ~£200/yr total on Standard.
At a glance.
Scored across ten dimensions.
Filled dots = score out of 5, weighted equally. A coastal day-sailor and an Atlantic-circuit cruiser will weight these very differently.
When each one wins.
Pick Windy for
- Coastal & day-sailing — free Windy covers 90% of cruising decisions where there's signal.
- Comparing models — flip between ECMWF and GFS in a single tap.
- Learning weather — the gradient overlays make systems and fronts visible.
- Budget-sensitive sailors — Premium at ~£20/yr is a no-brainer.
Pick PredictWind for
- Offshore & ocean passages — ARC rallies use it by default. Routing + satellite GRIBs + departure planning.
- Boats with polars — routing recommendations get genuinely useful once polars are set up.
- Iridium GO / Starlink — compressed GRIB delivery 200 NM from a cell tower.
- Weather-as-planning — if you agonise over departure windows days ahead, this is your tool.
The honest verdict.
Most comparisons treat this as winner-take-all. It isn't. The right answer depends on how far from a marina you intend to be.
Windy is a forecast viewer — the best in the world. Model coverage, visualisation, speed, and price are unmatched. For 95% of European coastal and Med cruising, free or Premium Windy is enough.
PredictWind is a passage-planning system — also the best in the world. Past mobile signal, with a 36-hour window mattering more than which café to anchor outside, the routing, polars, and satellite delivery become irreplaceable. The price starts looking like insurance.
Cleanest mental model: Windy is for now and the next 24 hours, PredictWind for the next 72. Most experienced cruisers run both. One honest pushback: don't pay PredictWind purely for the proprietary models — pay for the routing system that uses them.
FAQ.
Is the free version of Windy enough?
For coastal cruising — yes, for most people, most of the time. The free tier gives all major public models (ECMWF, GFS, ICON, NAM) at ~3-hour intervals. Premium adds resolution and lookahead, but free is a complete tool.
Are PredictWind's PWG and PWE models actually better?
Sometimes — especially on coastlines with complex orography. They're downscaled from public models (PWG on GFS, PWE on ECMWF). The improvement is real but marginal; the bigger value is the routing engine that uses them.
What about WindFinder, Buoyweather, or Windguru?
All real options. WindFinder is great for spot forecasts — see our WindFinder guide. None compete with Windy for visual comparison or PredictWind for routing, which is why this focuses on those two.
Which one for RYA Yachtmaster prep?
For coursework, neither — the syllabus teaches synoptic charts and isobaric analysis from first principles. As practice, Windy is the better learning tool. See our meteorology quizzes for the theory.
Try them yourself.
PredictWind
Offshore passages, weather routing, satellite GRIBs. Free trial with paid tiers.
Try PredictWind →The Windy link is non-affiliate. The PredictWind link is an affiliate link; TideLab may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. The verdict above is the same one we'd give a sailing friend.