Amphibious boat builders today

From one maker to licensed builders

Sealegs of New Zealand, which says it pioneered production amphibious boats, built its first production craft in 2004, and for years few other companies competed with it ^[16][24][6]. Sealegs has its own entry. The first boat from another builder to carry Sealegs wheels was the Smuggler Strata 770, a rigid inflatable from Auckland's Smuggler Marine that was released at the 2012 Auckland On The Water Boat Show ^[3].

In 2014 Sealegs began licensing its wheel system to other builders under the name Powered by Sealegs ^[1]. The first licensee under that scheme was ASIS Boats of Dubai, which showed a 6.5 m (21 ft) amphibious RIB at the Dubai International Boat Show in March 2014 ^[1][2]. Sealegs said at the time that more than 850 of its craft were in use after ten years ^[1][2]. The New Zealand builder Stabicraft also offered a Sealegs-equipped model, which a 2025 buyers' guide dates to 2012 to 2018 ^[16].

A court case and new wheel suppliers

Rival wheel kits brought a legal fight. In December 2016 Sealegs obtained an injunction against Orion Marine and Smuggler Marine over claims that they had breached its copyright in a three-legged amphibious vessel system, and it succeeded in the High Court ^[4][5]. Stryda Marine and a Chinese company linked to Orion's owner were also subject to the injunction ^[4]. New Zealand's Court of Appeal ruled for Orion and Smuggler and lifted the injunction in August 2019, and later that year the Supreme Court refused Sealegs leave to appeal ^[4][5]. Boating New Zealand later described Orion Marine's locally developed system as licensed to several popular boat brands, with Smuggler's Strata 800 as the first Smuggler model to use it ^[6].

Anura, an Auckland engineering company that gives 2012 as its founding year, was described in buyers' guides from 2025 and 2026 as quickly winning favor with boat builders in New Zealand and abroad ^[7][16][17]. By February 2023 it said more than 250 of its systems were in use, and it had begun factory installations with a US builder on the Bluewater 2550 center-console boat ^[8]. Its range runs from the S15, released in 2023 as a light system for tenders and small boats, to the larger S55, S65 and S75 High Power systems that it presented in early 2026 as its most capable yet ^[27][11]. In the United Kingdom, Warrior Boats partnered with Anura after a meeting at Metstrade 2024, with first boats planned for the third quarter of 2025 ^[10].

Tectrax took a different route, driving the wheels with batteries instead of an engine. Shown at the Hutchwilco New Zealand Boat Show in 2019, its All Wheel Electric Drive used battery-powered hub motors and was already being fitted by the aluminum builders Senator and McLay ^[13]. In November 2024 Tectrax and ZeroJet, a New Zealand maker of low-voltage electric jet drives, announced that they would merge ^[15].

How the wheel systems work

An amphibious boat is a normal hull driven on the water by outboard motors, a sterndrive or a jet ^[1][3][9]. The land gear is added to it: usually one wheel at the bow and one on each side of the stern, each on a leg that swings down for land and folds up against the hull at sea ^[6][9]. Some builders use four wheels with a pair at the bow, as on Ocean Craft Marine's AMP boats and the Stryda 900C ^[9][21].

On hydraulic systems, a small separate engine drives a pump that moves the legs, turns the wheels and works the brakes ^[9]. On the Stryda 900C, an Anura S25 system is powered by a 40 hp Briggs & Stratton engine in a soundproofed box at the transom, and its wheels stay braked unless power is applied ^[9]. The kits are heavy, adding about 500 kg (1,100 lb) to the Stryda and more than 800 lb (360 kg) to an Ocean Craft Marine 9.8 m ^[9][21]. Land speeds are low, about 5 to 6 mph (8 to 10 km/h), enough for a beach or ramp ^[14][18][21].

Electric drives replace the engine with batteries. The Tectrax T3000 on a Southern Boats TT756 tested in 2020 used a 72-volt lithium battery, electric wheel motors with regenerative braking and electrically driven pumps for the legs, giving about 35 minutes of driving with some soft sand or climbing, at up to 8 km/h (5 mph) ^[14]. By 2026 Tectrax's second-generation system was fully electric, with three axial-flux motors and 48-volt batteries ^[17]. Anura also sells electric-over-hydraulic power packs ^[12]. France's Iguana Yachts, which has its own entry, uses hydraulically lowered crawler tracks instead of wheels ^[25].

Builders and uses

New Zealand has the most builders. A 2025 buyers' guide counted nearly 75 amphibious models from 17 manufacturers there, including Smuggler, StabiX, Stryda, Osprey, Fin Chaser, Image, Southern, Senator and Flyfin, with most boats from builders other than Sealegs using Anura or Tectrax kits ^[16]. StabiX, spun off from Stabicraft in 2021, builds amphibious boats in Invercargill, including a 250 camper model on an Anura S25 system that reaches 5.6 mph (9 km/h) on land ^[18].

In Dubai and the United States the emphasis is on professional craft. ASIS Boats, founded in Dubai in 2005 by Roy Nouhra, moved from Sealegs licensing to its own four-wheel-drive system, the BAS 80-4, and builds for military and commercial users ^[19]. Ocean Craft Marine, headed by Nouhra and building in Annapolis, Maryland, makes AMP amphibious RIBs such as the 8.4 m and 9.8 m ^[20][21][22]. Its 9.8 m has dual bow wheels, a 40 hp engine for the hydraulics and a governor that holds land speed to about 6 mph (10 km/h), and the company sells a professional line to police, fire and military users ^[21].

Luxury tenders are a smaller niche. In 2016 the Swedish builder J Craft and Sealegs revealed an amphibious version of the 12.6 m (41 ft) J Craft Torpedo with twin pod drives, a 44-knot top speed and the Sealegs 100 wheel system, aimed at superyacht owners who want to land guests on remote beaches ^[23]. Rescue and tourism are growing uses. In late 2025 Broome Volunteer Sea Rescue Group in Western Australia took delivery of IBIS III, a 9.5 m RIB with an Anura S45 system, to cover more than 300 km (190 miles) of coast, and the New Zealand tour operators Cathedral Cove Water Taxi and Hahei Explorer now board passengers straight from the beach ^[12][26].

How fast the market grew

Sealegs, still the largest maker by volume, went from more than 850 craft in 2014 to its 1,500th in July 2020, with owners in 55 countries, and more than 1,850 by early 2025 ^{[1][24][16][17]}. Anura passed 250 systems by 2023 ^[8]. In 2025 Power Boat Magazine described Anura as quickly gaining ground and noted that rivals fitting Anura and Tectrax kits were multiplying ^[16].

Photos

Related entries

• SealegsAmphibious boats · 2004 to present
• Iguana YachtsAmphibious boats · 2008 to present
• How amphibious vehicles workHow it works ·
• SealanderAmphibious boats · 2011 to present