DON'T UPGRADE FROM BOATING HD – Navionics® Boating Review

This version does not allow you to download NOAA charts without a subscription. I've been a casual user of Boating HD, once or twice a year and not enough to justify a subscription. I was fine with the basic feature set and the ability to keep the freely available NOAA (gov't) charts updated. I naively assumed Navionics would maintain this behavior when Boating HD prompted me to upgrade and offered to transfer my data to the new version. Now my tracks are stuck in an app with no charts. Fortunately Boating HD can still be downloaded and allowed me to get charts for offline use. Restricting proprietary charts makes sense and I support Navionics protecting and profiting from their IP. But not allowing access to charts provided free by NOAA is a step in the wrong direction for maintaining loyal customers. In the future when I purchase a vessel and need a full time tablet based chart plotter I will not buy Navionics and will probably switch to an Android tablet running OpenCPN.
Review by Mary-ster on Navionics® Boating.