What Chase Boats and Support Vessels Covers
The term "chase boat" is used loosely in the industry, and that looseness causes real confusion when owners and captains start briefing yards or brokers. At one end of the spectrum you have a fast open boat - typically 10.0m to 14.0m - whose primary job is speed: intercepting guests on tenders, running ahead to a marina to clear berths, or keeping pace with a sailing yacht on a passage. At the other end you have what the industry increasingly calls a shadow vessel: a vessel large enough to carry fuel, a full toy programme, a chase tender of its own, and sometimes a decompression chamber or a security detail. Both sit under the same broad heading of superyacht support vessels, and both are addressed here.
For owners, the question is usually framed around programme: what does the yacht actually need to carry, and what is the mothership not equipped to provide? For captains and project managers, the framing is more operational - certified crew count, flag-state requirements, range under her own power, and the practicalities of keeping a second vessel maintained and manned across a season. We work across both framings, and the guides in this section are written to be useful to both audiences.
If you are new to the category, the most direct place to start is our overview of why 50m-plus programmes are now routinely specifying a dedicated chase platform. The short answer is that superyachts have grown faster than their garages, and the toy programmes owners expect - multiple jet skis, a foiling kit, a 6.0m chase tender of its own - no longer fit inside the hull without displacing something else.
The Key Decisions
Every chase boat brief comes back to four trade-offs, and being honest about them early saves significant time and money.
Speed versus capacity
A fast chase boat - one that will genuinely run at 45 knots or above in operational conditions - requires a light, narrow hull and high installed power. That combination is at direct odds with the deck volume needed to carry a serious toy programme, a full crew complement, and enough fuel for a coastal passage. The 14.0m to 16.0m range is where most chase-only briefs land, because it is long enough to carry a triple-outboard or twin-sterndrive driveline with meaningful payload, but short enough to keep the weight and cost manageable. Go larger and you are building a shadow vessel, which is a different category of procurement and operational commitment entirely.
Purpose-built versus converted
A purpose-built chase hull - vacuum-infused carbon or aluminium, with lifting points and bollard-pull ratings signed off by a naval architect - will outperform a converted passenger RIB or a repurposed patrol boat on every metric that matters to a working superyacht programme. The cost delta is real, typically 30 to 60 percent more on acquisition, but the operational case for a purpose-built platform is strong when the vessel will be deployed for five or more months per year. Conversions make sense for programmes that are genuinely uncertain about how much use the chase boat will see, or where the budget ceiling is fixed.
Aluminium versus composite
Aluminium is the default for shadow vessels and larger chase platforms above 18.0m: it is easier to repair in remote locations, holds its value more predictably, and the yards that build in aluminium at this scale have decades of relevant experience. Composite - whether glass-epoxy or carbon-foam - is the right call for chase boats where weight-to-speed ratio is the primary design driver. A well-specified aluminium chase at 14.0m will weigh 20 to 30 percent more than an equivalent composite hull and give up four to six knots at the top end. For a chase-only platform on a fast programme, that is a meaningful penalty.
The recently launched TYKUN X, which debuted at Monaco 2025, is a useful reference point for what the current generation of aluminium chase boats looks like when the brief is built around defence-grade structural standards and high-speed offshore performance in the same hull.
Crew and certification
A chase boat that carries sixteen guests at coastal certification in one jurisdiction may require a significantly larger certified crew than the same boat under a different flag, and the accommodation requirements that follow from that crew count can reshape the whole layout brief. Project managers need to nail the operating area and the flag state before the accommodation brief is finalised, not after. We see this sequencing error regularly, and it is expensive to correct at the fit-out stage.
Where most briefs land
For a 50.0m to 70.0m mothership on a mixed Mediterranean and Atlantic programme, the brief that recurs most often is a 12.0m to 16.0m chase-only hull with a top speed above 40 knots, capacity for eight to twelve guests, and enough deck space to carry two to three water toys plus a dive compressor. Owners on larger programmes - above 80.0m - will often run a second, slower support vessel in parallel, which is where the shadow vessel category becomes relevant. The two vessels serve different functions and the decision to run both is usually driven by the toy and fuel payload that the chase boat physically cannot carry at the speed the owner requires.
Where to Start
The chase boats hub is the right entry point if you want to move systematically through the category: it covers hull types, size bands, typical cost ranges, and links out to the builder and model-specific articles that sit beneath it.
If you already know the size band and want to go straight to builder intelligence, the model-specific articles in the industry news section are the most useful reference. They are written at specification grade, with sourced performance data and build-quality assessments, rather than as promotional copy.
For buyers who are earlier in the process and need to understand why the category has grown as quickly as it has - and what the operational case actually looks like across a full season - the industry news piece on why superyachts now want chase boats covers the structural reasons behind the trend and is worth reading before you start comparing hulls.
A few questions come up consistently from owners and captains who are new to the category:
What does a superyacht chase boat cost? At the 12.0m to 14.0m level, purpose-built composite chase hulls from reputable European yards start at roughly EUR 400,000 and run to EUR 900,000 depending on specification, driveline choice, and finish level. Aluminium hulls in the same size band tend to sit in the lower half of that range. Shadow vessels above 20.0m are a different order of magnitude: EUR 2.0m to EUR 8.0m is the working range for a well-specified new build, with significant variance depending on accommodation and equipment fit.
How fast should a chase boat be? The answer depends entirely on what it is chasing. A programme built around a 16-knot displacement mothership does not need a 50-knot chase boat; a 14-knot sailing yacht whose owner wants to go diving in a separate bay each morning does. The speed requirement should be derived from the programme, not the other way around.
Can a tender serve as a chase boat? A tender pressed into chase duty is a compromise that works on some programmes and fails badly on others. The key variable is frequency of use: a tender that is deployed as a chase boat twice per season will perform adequately; one that is expected to run ahead on every port entry, carry the dive programme, and meet guests at the airport will wear out early and create crew resentment. If the brief calls for genuinely frequent chase operations, the programme justifies a dedicated platform.
Talk to Us
We build chase boat and support vessel shortlists for owners, captains, and project managers on programmes of all sizes. The brief-gathering process is straightforward: we need to understand the mothership's operating area and speed profile, the payload the chase boat must carry, the crew and certification constraints, and the acquisition budget. With those four inputs we can return a shortlist of builders and available hulls within 48 hours.
We work across new builds, pre-owned hulls, and conversion projects, and we do not represent any single yard, so the shortlist we produce reflects what is actually available in the market rather than what we have a commercial interest in selling. If the brief is not yet clear enough to shortlist, we can run a structured discovery session first - typically a single hour with the captain or project manager - that produces a written brief you can use with any builder or broker.
The chase boats hub has contact details and links to the full range of reference material. If you are ready to brief us directly, the fastest route is the contact form there.