What do Sport and Commercial fisherman have in common, they rely on fish finders to help locate fish, and these locators need to be reliable, easy to use, and have accurate GPS. Now most of us fishermen are out fishing because we love the sport, but that does not mean we should not take advantage of the same technology to aid us in locating fish.
So, with so many fish finders on the market what is the right one for the body of water we fish (Rivers, Small Inland Lakes, Large Inland Lakes, Great Lakes, or the Ocean)?
I have fished all these bodies of water and I know how important it is to select the right Fish Finder for specific fishing conditions. Here I have listed the Top 9 Fish Finders on the Market for Rivers, Small lakes, Large lakes, the Great lakes, and the Ocean. I did not rank these fish finders in any order, but instead focused on what is best for the above mentioned bodies of water (Fresh and Salt).
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Features To Look For
Easy To Use: We do not want to spend hours reading manuals and playing with buttons or the touchscreen
Display/ Image Clarity: Needs to be clear with easy interpretation of structure, contour, bottom, and fish
Sonar Technology: Must have good DownScan, SideScan, and Crystal Clear Images for fish, structures, and contour
GPS Capability: Needs to be accurate and provide markers/tracking capability
Price: Needs to be best price for the level of technology (features, functionality, sonar, clarity, ease of use, etc..)
*Note, The term CHIRP stands for Compressed High-Intensity Radar Pulse and is a frequency-modulated sound (sonar) pulse. Instead of transmitting a distinct pulse beneath the boat, CHIRP Technology modifies the pulse so that a range of frequencies are transmitted by the transducer.
iBobber Wireless Fish Finder
ReelSonar Wireless Bluetooth Smart Fish Finder
For the fisherman that fishes small lakes from shore, canoe, kayak, boat, or on the ice you may want to consider the iBobber. The iBobber is a good little fish finder at a very affordably price and it will get the job done. This Fish finder is light, portable, castable, and comes with GPS & Trip Log.
Using your iPhone or Android, fishermen can mark fish, map contours & depth, get water temperatures, and even capture photos to share on social media. This unit has LED beacon, strike & fish alarms, and an anti-glare setting for increased visibility during bright outdoor lighting.
Deeper PRO+ Smart Sonar
GPS Portable Wireless Wi-Fi Fish Finder for Shore and Ice Fishing
For the fisherman that fishes small to medium sized lakes (shore, canoe, kayak, boat, or ice fishing) and wants the best portable & castable fish finder on the Market, you will want the Deeper Pro GPS.
The PRO+ uses Wi-Fi to connect to your smartphone or tablet, giving very fast data transfer and strong connectivity. It has a casting range of 330ft and scans down to 260ft. The Deeper Pro can be mounted on to your boat easily as well and has Flasher Display with Zoom. See depth, structure, vegetation, bottom contour (hard or soft) and water temperatures.
HummingbirdHelix 7 fish finder
Hummingbird 410950-1 HELIX 7 CHIRP MSI (MEGA Side Imaging) GPS G3 Fish Finder
This fish Finder is great for small to larger lakes and gives incredible crystal clear viewing down to 125 ft. The Hummingbird Helix 7 has exceptional Down Imaging, Side Imaging, and Dual Spectrum CHIRP Sonar. It comes in a 7-Inch screen with 800H x 480V resolution color TFT display.
Easily identifies structures and contours.
With two display modes, you can easily identify structures & contours, add/remove detail, account for water depth-temperature-turbulence, and even watch your lure presentation
Lowrance HOOK2 5
5-inch Fish Finder with TripleShot Transducer and US Inland Lake Maps Installed
The Lowrance HOOK2 5 is great for small and large lakes (open water or ice fishing). It comes complete with a TripleShot transducer which gives you DownScan sonar (straight down 300′), SideScan sonar (300′ to each side), and CHIRP sonar (fish symbol) views. It’s easy to mount (transducer can be mounted on the transom, inside the hull, on the trolling motor, or through a scupper hole) and the auto tuning sonar and phone like menus makes this one very user friendly.
Garmin Striker Plus 4 with Dual-beam
Striker Plus 4 with Dual-Beam Transducer
This unit works great for all bodies of water and is very affordable. It’s a bit small with a 3.5” screen, but comes with a big punch. You get CHIRP, ClearVu Imaging for DownScanning (830′ in saltwater and 1,750′ in freshwater), and a clear defined fish symbol for identifying your fish.
The Garmin Striker Plus 4 fish finder has Traditional Sonar, CHIRP, DownScan, and an optional transducer for ice fishing. It advanced signal processing greatly reduces sonar noise from other fishermen. Multiple imaging types can be loaded and viewed at the same time.
Garmin Striker 7SV with Transducer
7″ GPS Fishfinder with Chirp Traditional, ClearVu and SideVu Scanning Sonar Transducer and Built in Quickdraw Contours Mapping Software
This may be the best Fish Finder on the Market for all bodies of water. The Garmin Striker Plus 7sv is a premium fish finder, loaded with features, for a great price.
Its large 7” High Resolution screen (800 x 480 Pixels) produces crisp clear viewing of structures, submerged objects, contours, bait fish and game fish. Its simple interface makes it very easy to operate and allows you to view Side Imaging, CHIRP Sonar, and ClearVU at the same time or each one separately with the ease of a button.
Its GPS is second to none with high-sensitivity & high-accurate. The GPS is incredible for aiding in navigating and creating your own fishing maps (up to 2 million acres & 5,000 waypoints)
Garmin ECHOMAP UHD 93sv
9” Keyed-Assist Touchscreen Chartplotter with U.S. LakeVü g3 and GT54UHD-TM transducer
If you want the best fish finder for big water (Fresh or Salt Water), then you have found it!
The Garmin ECHOMAP has a Sunlight-readable 9” touchscreen with keyed assist. The GT54 transducer has Ultra High-Definition ClearVu, Ultra High-Definition SideVü, preloaded LakeVu G3 (inland maps with integrated Navionics data, 17, 000 lakes up to 1’ contours), and the CHIRP traditional sonar. If that’s not enough, you can share sonar data with nearby fisherman using the ECHOMAP Plus, UHD, and Ultra models.
Lowrance Elite-12 Ti2
12-inch Fish Finder Active Imaging 3-in-1Transducer, Wireless Networking, Real-Time Map Creation US/CAN Navionics+ Mapping Card
This is another great fish finder for Large lakes, Great Lakes, Lake of the Woods, and the Ocean. This unit comes with WiFI & BlueTooth and allows you to update maps and share data with other Lowrance users. There is a MicroSD card slot for expanding memory and creating more waypoints, hot fishing spots, and custom mapping. The High Resolution 12-inch SolarMAX display gives clear crisp images identifying bait fish, game fish, structure, contour, and bottom detail. For viewing choose from CHIRP, DownImaging, SideImaging, and much more..
Lowrance HDS-9 LIVE
9″ Fish Finder No Transducer Model is compatible with StructureScan 3D and Active Imaging Sonar. Smartphone integration
This Fish Finder is for the Great lakes and Ocean and may be the most advanced Finder out there. It has Smartphone integration and preloaded C-MAP US Enhanced mapping.
This unit comes with two transducers that can be mounted anywhere on the boat, giving you two Sonar Views at the same time. What a way to cover more water and locate fish faster.
View CHIRP Sonar with StructureScan 3D or StructureScan HD to get the best possible view of fish, structure, and contour. The dual core Processor provides more speed and power for faster screen images. The Color Sonar gives color quality another meaning for fish finders and gives picture perfect image results of SideScan, DownScan, TotalScan & StructureScan HD/3D quality.
Switching between sonar frequencies for depths up to 1,000’ is as easy as touching the screen or bottoms.