Recreational Boating Industry Statistics 2026: Participation, Spending & Market Trends

Recreational boating is one of the few parts of the outdoor economy where the customer relationship lasts for years rather than a weekend. A boat is bought, financed, insured, fuelled, stored, launched, repaired, upgraded and eventually resold, and most of that money moves through marinas, dealers, boatyards, rental fleets and charter operators.

The 2025 data shows a market that cooled at the showroom while holding up almost everywhere else. New boat unit sales fell for a second straight year, yet total retail marine spending slipped only modestly, because fuel, docking, maintenance, accessories, insurance and used boat transactions are tied to an installed fleet of roughly 11.7 million registered vessels rather than to this year's showroom traffic.

This report pulls together the most recent public United States and Canadian data available in September 2026. Reported figures carry their source. Where current-year numbers have not been published, Fizel Research estimates are labelled and the arithmetic behind them is shown. United States and Canadian measures are kept separate, because they are built on different definitions, different currencies and different collection methods.

Two 2026 figures in this report are Fizel Research estimates rather than published statistics: roughly $54 billion in US retail marine spending, and a US registered fleet of roughly 11.7 million vessels. Both are derived in the methodology section and should be treated as planning benchmarks until full-year 2026 data is released.

Reported figures come from the National Marine Manufacturers Association, NMMA Canada, the US Bureau of Economic Analysis, the US Coast Guard, Transport Canada and Statistics Canada. Every figure is labelled United States or Canada. United States dollars and Canadian dollars are never combined, and no single North American market total is constructed from measures built on different definitions.

The Bureau of Economic Analysis reported that the US outdoor recreation economy generated $696.7 billion in value added in 2024, or 2.4% of GDP. Within that, boating and fishing was the largest conventional outdoor activity at $38.4 billion in current-dollar value added, and the largest conventional activity in 34 states.

Value added is not retail spending. It measures the contribution of production to GDP, net of the inputs consumed along the way, and the BEA figure combines boating with fishing, so it cannot be read as a boating-only sales number. NMMA's $54 billion, by contrast, is what Americans actually spent at retail on boats, engines, trailers, accessories, fuel, financing, insurance, docking and maintenance in 2025.

For operators, the practical version is simpler. Value added tells you how boating compares with other parts of the economy. Retail spending tells you how much money is moving through marine businesses, and it is the number that maps onto slips, service bays, parts counters and rental desks.

NMMA reported 215,237 new boats sold at US retail in 2025, down 8.8% from 236,070 in 2024, with freshwater fishing boats holding up better than the average at a 1.5% decline. Over the same period, total US retail marine spending moved from $55.6 billion in 2024 to $54 billion in 2025. Fizel Research calculates that as a decline of about 2.9%, using those two published totals.

A new boat is a large, financeable, deferrable purchase, so it reacts quickly to rates and confidence. Fuel, storage, insurance, service and accessories do not. Aftermarket accessories alone accounted for $12.1 billion of 2025 spending, which is more than the entire reported value of the pre-owned boat market.

The estimate assumes flat nominal spending in 2026. Soft new-boat demand pulls down, while the large installed fleet and resilient fuel, docking, maintenance and accessories spending push back. The range allows for a further 3% decline if unit sales keep sliding, or a 5% gain if replacement demand and pricing recover together.

NMMA reported 867,059 pre-owned boat sales in 2025, worth $10.8 billion, with pre-owned outboard boats leading unit volume. Set against 215,237 new units, the used market is where most transactions, most trade-ins and most first-time buyers sit, and it feeds directly into the service, storage and parts businesses that inherit those boats.

For dealers, the mix matters more than the headline. A pre-owned unit brings lower ticket revenue, a higher proportion of cash and financed private-party activity, and a stronger tie to service work. Volume is concentrated in used inventory even when showroom traffic is quiet, which is why dealer cash flow often looks steadier than new-boat statistics suggest.

The fleet has been stable rather than flat. Five years of data sit inside a band of roughly 400,000 vessels, with the 2021 peak reflecting pandemic-era buying and the 2023 low partly reflecting state registration cycles and deregistrations rather than a collapse in boat ownership.

Registrations are an ownership signal, not a participation measure. They count vessels that a state requires to be registered, which in most states means motorized craft. Canoes, kayaks and paddleboards rarely appear, so the 628,507 registered paddlecraft represent a small slice of actual paddling activity. Anyone sizing paddlesports from this table will understate it badly.

Transport Canada states that more than 12 million Canadian adults take part in recreational boating each year. Statistics Canada, asking a different question, found that 10% of Canadian households reported boating, sailing, canoeing, kayaking, rafting, rowing, dragon boating or seadooing close to home in 2023, with New Brunswick and Nova Scotia at 15% and British Columbia at 14%.

Those two numbers are not versions of the same statistic. One counts adults who boat anywhere over a year, the other counts households reporting a close-to-home activity in a specific survey year. Both are useful, and neither should be presented as the Canadian participation rate.

On the business side, NMMA Canada puts the annual economic impact of Canadian recreational boating at C$13.9 billion and 80,500 jobs, and reports nearly C$1.1 billion in annual imports of American-built boats and engines. That import figure is worth noting for dealers on both sides of the border, because it means Canadian inventory costs are exposed to exchange rates and cross-border trade conditions in a way that service and storage revenue is not.

Operator cards are a useful leading indicator. NMMA Canada reported nearly 162,300 pleasure craft operator cards issued in 2024, up 2.2%. That counts cards issued during the year, not the full population of licensed boaters, but a rising issue rate points to new entrants rather than a shrinking base.

The retail picture points the same way. NMMA reported Florida as the top state for marine spending in 2025, followed by Texas, Michigan, North Carolina and New York. Warm-water states dominate on volume, but the presence of Michigan and New York shows how much revenue short northern seasons can still generate when the fleet is large enough.

Concentration has an operational meaning. In Florida and Texas, a marina competes on availability, service turnaround and convenience across a long season. In Michigan, New York or most of Canada, the same business has to earn a full year of revenue inside five or six months, which changes how deposits, storage contracts and off-season billing are structured.

July alone accounted for 905 reported incidents, more than the whole of October through March combined. The curve is steeper than most seasonal outdoor businesses face, and it reinforces what marina and rental operators already know: the revenue year is short, the staffing peak is sharp, and the administrative work of deposits, waivers, billing and disputes lands in the same weeks as the busiest days on the water.

Three conclusions follow from the data above. The installed fleet is the durable asset in this industry, not annual unit sales. Recurring revenue from slips, storage, insurance and maintenance is less cyclical than the showroom. And used boat transactions keep bringing customers into service bays, parts counters and dealer finance offices even in a soft year.

Fizel works with each of these operations, and the detail by business type sits on the dedicated pages for marinas, boat dealers, boat rentals and charters and marina service and boatyards.

A marine business rarely has one payment pattern. In a single week a dealer might take a five-figure boat deposit, a card-present parts sale, a financed balance and a service invoice paid remotely. A marina bills seasonal slip contracts on a schedule, sells fuel at the dock, invoices repair work of very different sizes and processes rental or transient dockage from visitors who may be paying with a foreign card.

Two existing Fizel guides go into the operational detail: payment processing for marinas and payment processing for boat dealers. If the question is what a current processing arrangement actually costs across that mix, a statement analysis reads the fee lines directly rather than working from a quoted rate.

Fizel Research also estimates US retail marine spending of roughly $54 billion in 2026, with a range of $52.5 billion to $56.5 billion. The central case assumes flat nominal spending: continued softness in new boat units offset by an installed fleet that still needs fuel, dockage, insurance, parts and service.

Neither estimate is a forecast published by NMMA, the US Coast Guard or any other organization. Both are Fizel Research figures produced for planning purposes, and both should be replaced as soon as the relevant 2026 data is released. No Canadian retail spending estimate is offered here, because no defensible public baseline exists for it.

• Bureau of Economic Analysis, Outdoor Recreation Economic Statistics, US and States, 2024, released March 2026.
• US Coast Guard, Recreational Boating Statistics 2024.
• NMMA, US Recreational Marine Spending Reached $54B in 2025, July 2026.
• NMMA, Latest data shows retail boat sales softened in 2025, March 2026.
• NMMA, 2025 pre-owned boat market.
• NMMA, 2024 US recreational marine spending.
• Transport Canada, boating safety news release, May 2026.
• Statistics Canada, Tapping into the water data, July 2026.
• Statistics Canada, Water safety by the numbers, July 2024.
• NMMA Canada, Canadian recreational boating economic impact, February 2025.
• NMMA Canada, pleasure craft operator cards issued in 2024, July 2025.

Related Fizel Research: Fishing Industry Statistics 2026 covers angler participation and spending, and Camping Industry Statistics 2026 covers the camping and outdoor hospitality side of the same customer base.

Fizel Research, September 2026. Reported statistics are attributed to their publishing organization. Fizel Research calculations and estimates are labelled wherever they appear and are never presented as third-party data. This report will be updated when 2026 spending and registration data is published.