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Nautical Map View

Overview​

Paid feature

The Nautical Map View plugin is a paid feature of the OsmAnd app.

Nautical Map View is a detailed graphic representation of oceans, seas, coastal areas, and rivers that helps you navigate the water and know popular routes, obstacles in your waterway, nearest harbors, anchorages, and other important landmarks.

A nautical map is a highly detailed topographical map to help skippers navigate a vessel on a selected course on the water. It is similar to a road map for those traveling by car. Often called a 'Chart' for historical reasons, it is a detailed graphic representation of the oceans, seas, coastal areas, and rivers.

Nautical maps are important for professional sailors and amateurs who rent a boat to cruise the city's canals. The maps provide them with various information such as sailing routes, navigation lights, danger zones, zones where it is allowed or prohibited to sail or dock, etc.

Nautical maps

Why the Nautical Theme Matters​

All professional sailors are required to have official nautical maps on their ships. These maps are published by authorized agencies and are quite expensive. The agencies invest heavily in keeping the maps up to date. They issue regular updates to the maps, but because it takes time to verify the information and process the updates, nautical maps are never completely up to date.

Based on OpenSeaMap data, OsmAnd Nautical maps are created by people who use them. Each map user can contribute to the map by adding information they find important and useful for themselves, thereby making the map more detailed and accurate, ideal for orienteering or route planning.

Required Setup Parameters​

The following setup makes the Nautical map show up on the screen:

  1. Purchase and Enable Nautical map view plugin.
  2. Download the Nautical maps.
  3. Set the Nautical map style for the required profile.

Set Nautical Map Style​

Go to: Android Menu → Configure map → Map rendering → Map style → Nautical

Nautical Map Type in Android

Use the Map legend for any reference to what is shown on the nautical map. It explains the symbolic elements on a nautical map and serves as a reference to help you navigate when in doubt. By setting the Nautical map style, you can get the best view of the downloaded and displayed nautical data.

To change the current map style to Nautical, you need to make the following settings:

  1. Select the required profile.
  2. Open Configure map.
  3. Scroll down to Map style, open it, and check the Nautical.

Download Nautical Maps​

Go to: Android Menu → Maps & Resources → Nautical maps

Nautical plugin maps view Android

For optimal presentation, maps can be adapted to current needs: marks and symbols can be added with depth points and, as needed, contours. On the other hand, standard maps with information about inland, onshore, and nearshore waters information for a particular region can be a good complement to the information about waterways on a Nautical map.

When you download a nautical map, more details related to Boat navigation appear on the map. Some types of Nautical maps contain details such as:

  • Nautical marks and symbols.
    Marks and symbols contain all nautical navigational marks for both inland and coastal navigation. Knowing these marks will help you predict the location of rocks, obstructions, anchorages, buoys, currents, deep and shallow water, and sides of the channel, regardless of the direction, etc. Marks and symbols are downloaded once for the entire world.

  • Depth points.
    Nautical data from the depth point packages are represented by numbers displayed on the water that indicate the shallowest depth at a particular location. Depth points are available for each hemisphere and some regions.

  • Depth contours.
    Depth contour packages allow you to define areas of equal depth. They are intended to visualize changes in relief beneath the water's surface. Depth contours can be downloaded for certain areas and then turned off if you do not need them.

Depth Numbers

All depth numbers on the Nautical Maps are indicated in meters.

Disable Nautical Map Style​

To remove Nautical and display one of OsmAnd's conventional maps, do any of the following:

  • Disable the Nautical plugin.
  • Change the map style to anything else than Nautical.
NOTE

Disabling the Nautical plugin does not remove loaded nautical data, so even if you change the rendering method from nautical to any other method when nautical data is downloaded, it remains visible on the map.

Nautical Profile​

Go to: Android Menu → Settings → App profiles

Nautical depth contours in Android

Nautical map can be included in any profile. However, it is most valuable in the Boat profile and especially in Boat navigation.

Nautical Map Style​

The Nautical plugin in OsmAnd extends the vector layer map styles with the Nautical map style. It allows you to display map data according to Nautical map rules, for example: yellow areas for land and shoals, light blue areas for shallow waters, etc. For more information, see Map legend.

Depth Points​

Nautical maps

Depth point packages are available for Europe, the Northern Hemisphere, and the Southern Hemisphere and are informational. Depth points indicate changes in topography below the water's surface, indicating the shallowest depth. This is necessary for Boat navigation. After downloading, you need to turn on Depth contours to display it on the map.

Depth Contours​

Go to: Android Menu → Configure map → Show → Nautical depth

Nautical depth contours in Android

When a Nautical map is displayed on the screen, you can adjust what you see:

NOTE

You can help the OsmAnd app increase the Depth contours database by adding your information using OpenSeaMap

Seabed Details​

Go to: Android Menu → Configure map → Other map attributes → Seabed detail

Seabed details

Seabed data contains information about vegetation and general surface material such as rocky rocks, shells, gravel, coral, silt, etc. Due to the international classification of seafloor data, there are options for displaying such details on a map: simple, category, all or omit. Use the Seabed area map legend for more information.

  • Simple (for Android version)- shows the seamark symbols in accordance with INT-1 Ref, indicating the nature of the seabed surface.
  • Category - in addition to the seamark symbol, also shows the relevant seamark tag, indicating the natural material, or the seaweed and seagrass category.
  • All - in addition to the seamark symbol, tag, or category, also shows qualifications such as fine, sticky, coarse, etc. For seagrass and seaweed, shows data marked with the taxon and genus tags.
  • Omit - does not show details of the seafloor.
NOTE

For more details on the classification of the surface details and the rendering options, refer to OSM's seamark wiki.

This article was last updated in June 2023