Boating & Marine Tradeshows

The shape of the Boating & Marine show season

Boat shows carry most of this catalog, and the calendar is built for winter and early-spring buying season rather than summer.

• Fort Lauderdale International Boat Show opens the season in the fall.
• Discover Boating Miami International Boat Show and Seattle Boat Show both land in February, on opposite coasts.
• Palm Beach International Boat Show follows in March, alongside Great Alaska Sportsman Show and Atlantic City Boat Show elsewhere on our calendar.
• St. Petersburg Power & Sailboat Show opens the new year in January.

Season and geography

February is the busiest month in our listings for this topic, bracketed by Fort Lauderdale's fall date and the March cluster that includes Palm Beach, the Great Alaska Sportsman Show, and other regional shows. Florida carries much of the calendar, spreading across Fort Lauderdale and Miami Beach, while Seattle is the most-listed city outside the Southeast. The catalog also includes shows adjacent to boating, like the outdoor-focused GoPro Mountain Games in Vail, that broaden the topic beyond boat sales specifically into the wider outdoor and marine lifestyle space.

Choosing a show

Attendees shopping for a boat get the most out of the large regional shows in Fort Lauderdale, Miami Beach, and Seattle, where dealer inventory tends to concentrate around the in-water and on-floor listings. Exhibitors working a single region should anchor around whichever Florida show falls in their season, then add the Seattle date to reach the Pacific Northwest and the St. Petersburg or Atlantic City dates to round out the East Coast calendar.