Let’s catch Fish! Fishing is an awesome sport and a way to spend time. A bad day of fishing is better than a good day at work. Go for fishing in familiar or unfamiliar water! Then you need good fish finder. It is an active sonar device that will locate the fish and their sizes. Does it sound like a Batman gadget, Right? This device will make you smart and save a lot of time by searching fish. It is not easy to find the best fish finder for the money. But how do you choose from all the different manufacturers and models on the market? It is a tough task and whoever has gone through this process knows about it now. That is where best fishfinder reviews come in handy.

As you are still reading, we are assuming that you seriously want to buy a good fish finder and are looking for fish finder reviews. You are at the perfect place. In fact, this is it! You are in the right place at this moment which will teach you everything required to go for best fishfinder within next 20 minutes. Whether you are a beginner or a pro, you will enjoy reading our best fishfinder article because we made this article detailed and informative. There is information for everybody so if you are already a professional, you might not need half of the article as you already know those stuff.

Editorial Pick

You will agree with me when I say: selecting the best fishfinder isn’t an easy task. That is why we create a list for you to better understanding. After researching online and spending hours and discussed with 20 customers, we have shortlisted 10 fish finder which you can buy. Some of the fishfinders are not for everyone because some of them are carrying a high price tag. Lowrance HDS 7 GEN 3 fishfinder is our favorite fish finder from the 10 fishfinders. The HDS 7 GEN 3 has drawn our attention with features, customer satisfaction, and performance.

Best Fishfinder 2018

Before starting reviewing we want to tell you that we will simply discuss fishfinder. We only keep those products on your list which is available on the market right now. We will not discuss those items which are in available in the market anymore. There is no point of discussing or reviewing the product that you can’t buy when it is necessary for you. So we will review the currently available market product.

Moreover, we will pick 10 best product from the market for you, which is better than rest. You will find some product features are perfectly suitable for you to fish hunting ground within your budgets. If you switch you fishing hunting location deep sea to the inland lake than the product preference will be change. For that reason, we will not be the ranking amount the 10 fishfinders. We only discuss with them how you will get benefit out of it.

Well, let’s get into the reviews!

Device Name	Display Size	BEAM
Lowrance HDS 7 GEN 3	7″ diagonal	Dual Beam
Garmin Striker 7SV	7″ diagonal	Dual Beam
Simrad GO7 XSE	7″ diagonal	Dual Beam
Garmin Striker 4	3.5″ diagonal	Dual Beam
Humminbird Helix 5	5″ diagonal	Dual Beam
Lowrance hook 7	7″ diagonal	Dual Beam
Humminbird Helix 9	9″ diagonal	Dual Beam
Raymarine Dragonfly 4 pro	4.3″ diagonal	Single Beam
ibobber	Smartphone	Single Beam
Deeper fish finder	Smartphone	Single Beam

1. Lowrance HDS 7 GEN 3 – Fresh & Saltwater Fishfinder 

The first fishfinder we pick to talk about is the Lowrance HDS 7 GEN 3 from Lowrance in the market. If you are looking for a product which has cool features that enhance your fishing experience into next level, then you should select Lowrance HDS 7 GEN 3.  This product integrates fishfinder technologies with High Definition System and multi-touch display. However, that is not the only trick up its sleeve. The fishfinder packs in many cutting-edge features to ensure ultimate performance.

Although it’s not very much inexpensive, this fishfinder offers a few impressive features for the price! In this review, we will go into every aspect of this fishfinder and find out whether it’s worth your money.

We also have a detailed review on Lowrance HDS 7 Gen 3 Review in case if you want to check that out.

When you need detail and accurate result with cool designed equipment. All-NEW Lowrance HDS 7 GEN 3 is your choice. You fall in love with it from the first look. The product has multitouch and keypad operation easy to use displays and advance navigation and user interface built-in wireless connectivity. Easy to set up and use with LED-backlit, widescreen colorful display the touch screen much easier than the other unit. HDS 7 GEN 3 is big clear yet small enough to fit anywhere on your boat.

In lowrance HDS series, HDS 7 Gen 3 is an improved generation from HDS 7 Gen 2. Lowrance HDS 7 Gen 3 is much more different from its predecessor. It is a user-friendly unit, better performance under Salt Water. It offers so much feature in its size. This unit is most popular in its HDS series so far. This unit takes state-of-the-art technology.

2. Garmin Striker 7SV -Fishfinder with CHIRP ClearVu/SideVu 

If you are looking for a fishfinder at a good price with GPS and CHIRP capabilities, then this can be a great pick to go for. This unit is a tremendous value. Despite having a lot of functionality, Garmin has done a really good job at making the Striker 7SV very intuitive to operate.

Garmin Striker 7SV offer you a better way of finding fish. Now you can mark your favorite spots and navigate back to it next day. Not only that, you can also mark boat dock place to find your way back to your starting position.

This unit comes with a touchscreen and a detailed GPS would be great for a worth of a price. The GPS and waypoint tracking were a little tricky at first but it only took two trips to get the hang of it. Like using a new handset.

3. Simrad GO7 XSE – Chartplotter Navigation Display 

This is actually a pretty interesting package deal that we will talk about. It comes with almost everything that you might need to a perfect fit for compact sportboats and dayboats. The Simrad GO7 XSE  has everything you need to fish on the bay/ocean or somewhere else and you will find everything works flawlessly.

It is a full touchscreen unit, unlike lowrance unit. Simrad and lowrance both come from the same parent company Navico, therefore the transducer is the same for both units. Simrad GO7 XSE unit is very easy to set up and use. This unit allows you to see the top view and 3D like a view can remember waypoints on fish, structure or anything else. This unit tracks your route surprisingly. This is the one-stop device.

The Simrad will blow your mind with its simplicity of using all the technology. The charts are amazingly detailed and the GPS is very accurate. You will get excellent quality side imaging and down imaging from this unit.

4. Garmin Striker 4 – Sonar and GPS Plotter

The next up is another dual-beam fishfinder. Garmin Striker 4 fishfinder has been the best seller for a period of a long time in the fishfinder & Depth Finders industry. Probably, this unit is the most sold fishfinder device on the planet right now.  You can get it at a reasonable

price compared to the features. All in all, you should definitely have a detailed look at this unit. When we say that we will find you the best fishfinder, we try to find the device like this one. Garmin also brings Striker 4 portable kit as a variant Striker 4.

This fishfinder is very nice color and equipped with GPS well performed well enough. You can mark your favorite spots, shows speed, time. This unit is very sensitive to depth reading with tenths of a foot accuracy. It comes with the transducer to mount on boat or trolley motor.

This unit provides so much detail information, with a great navigation support. This is a great tool for any fisherman. It is very easy to install. It is amazingly user-friendly with its clarity and a worth the price.

5. Humminbird Helix 5 – So many features with relatively low price 

We are taking a step away from Lowrance. Garmin and looking at some other options, the next offering we have at our hand is the Humminbird Helix 5. There is no denying that Helix series of fishfinder has become sort of a benchmark for the top of line customer of fishfinder. Although they are the consumer-minded manufacturer, they made their product equally attractive for professional users also.

Hummingbird is best known as offering product price is relatively low price with many features. Helix 5 series is a perfect example of that. The Helix 5 unit comes with sonar GPS features, built-in uniMap widescreen color display.

The Humminbird website does little to clarify the differences between the many products in the Helix line. Helix 5 is a first successful product of its series. It became a success for its nice looking product, low price offering, and durable product life. Simply it is a great product, you want to hang out with while fishing.

6. Lowrance hook 7 Freshwater Fishfinder

 Don’t worry! We did not take money from Lowrance but their product is good enough to take it off our list. This is another famous and awesome fishfinder to go for. Hook-7 is a fishfinder/ Chartplotter that offers proven features at a great value without compromising anglers.

The HOOK-7 give you a clear and complete underwater environment view beneath your boat with combination the benefits of chirp sonar and down scan imaging technology. This unit features enhanced sonar sensitivity, noise rejection and excellent target separation that make you see target fish as well as baitfish.

The Hook 7 offers good graphics, easy to install. It has so many features sometimes, it is being hard to be user-friendly and it locks up a lot and has to be reset. Lowrance has a great reputation for providing a durable product with great accurate data.

7. Humminbird Helix 9 – GPS Chartplotting 

This is more like an advanced version of previous Helix model that we talk about. Humminbird has huge popularity among country’s professional fisherman community. Humminbird uses to bring trendy product features with an affordable price and Helix is not an expectation of that trend. It has 4000 watts PTP power output, GPS Chartplotter. Helix 9 provides you crystal-clear images for easy viewing in harsh sunlight. Highly visible, easy to use.

To intake their brand image they continuously survey the consumer needs and take their opinion in order to make fishfinder more effective product in terms of fulfilling customer needs. As a result of that Humminbird come up with their new model Helix 9 with all the features needed for fishing.

Now you can enjoy your fishing trips on the lake or go for professional fishing new Humminbird Helix 9 was designed such a way you don’t need to worry about. This is very easy to install and operate connected to the AIS radio with minimal effort.

8. Raymarine Dragonfly 4 pro – Navionics+ Dual Channel Sonar/GPS

 By this time, you may be wondering why have we move away from the famous companies like Lowrance, Humminbird or Garmin. We are focusing more on the underdogs, that’s because those products they aren’t getting a  lot of attention. Now we are about to change that rules.

The next fishfinder on our list is Raymarine Dragonfly 4 Pro. Dragonfly offers you a superior fishing electronics made incredible with advanced technologies including wide chirp. The Raymarine and this unit have highly rated for a kayak due to its size, bright screen, and bottom picture quality. It’s Built-in Wi-Fi allows you to stream Dragonfly sonar to a smart mobile app. You can pause, rewind and share sonar imagery from your smartphone.

The Dragonfly’s compact mounting system makes installation simple. Dragonfly 4 pro is waterproof unit user-friendly.   This unit is appropriate for use in fresh or saltwater locations with its clarity with affordable price. The mount is easy to upgrade. The device has the fog-resistant capability.

9. iBobber – Wireless Sonar Fishfinder 

If you are not ready to spend a lot of money on a fishfinder right now but yet if you are looking to get one of the better-performed fishfinders from the market, then iBobber Wireless fishfinder is a great option. The price is budget friendly but the cool features with the product.

iBobber is the smallest and lightest wireless Bluetooth smart fishfinder for iOS and Android devices. The mobile fishfinder and app that you can carry with you wherever you want fishing. The iBobber was designed with flexibility and portability in mind.  Using a smart device you can mark fish, map depth, underwater structure and share on social media directly with few touch.

The iBobber is one of the best personal fishfinder available in the market. It is ideal for kayak, raft or canoe fishing. It works both in freshwater and saltwater. You can even go for ice fishing with iBobber. Free mobile app syncs via Bluetooth smart to the iBobber device. This unit allows you to map waterbed, log water temps and depth. You can mark spots with iBobber device. It has a built-in beacon and fish alarms which great for ice fishing and night fishing.

iBobber bring a great concept in fishfinder industry. It is extremely reliable and works very accurate. It will be a perfect gift for your husband, friend or beloved one.

10. Deeper Fishfinder – Smart Fishfinder

So, we will end our best fishfinder list with this Deeper Fishfinder. This unit is a wireless, castable echo sounder with affordable price. The device floats on the surface of the water and transmits detailed bottom straight to the smartphone or tablet screen. It captures depth, bottom structure, temperature, fish location other data that are essential for fishing.

You don’t need to wi-fi or mobile data connection at the fishing spots. The Deeper smart fish finder device has an internal Bluetooth access point that connects to your smartphone or tablet. All you have to do download Deeper app and install on your smartphone before fishing. Unlikely iBobboer, it connects through Bluetooth relatively short distance. It is the perfect fishing example for ice fishing, canal fishing.

Deeper fishfinder will be the most profitable expansion to your angling gear when you are practicing shore angling. Deeper is a Compact and versatile gadget. You can use an adaptable arm mount to fasten to the gadget outside kayak. So you have a lot of room left to fish and paddling. Deeper smart fishfinder is a small, high capacity echo-sounder ideal for adventurous kayak angling, small boat angling, and ice angling.

Best Fishfinder Buyer’s Guide

It’s easy to get lost in product so many features. While taking the most important decision. When it comes to choosing a fishfinder. How does it will help me to catch a lot of big fish? The best fishfinder reviews will help you to find out a perfect suitable fishfinder for you.

For those who don’t know, fishfinder comes with several things you need to consider before you actually spend the hard earned money. Before picking a fish finder you to consider the types of the fish finder, whether it includes GPS or not, display resolution, how much transmitting power you need and in which frequency fish finder work best in inland, coastal or deep water?

The Technology behind a fishfinder? 

There are three types of fish finder are available; dedicated fish finders that perform no other function, combination products that also include a chart plotter, and multifunction network systems offering a smorgasbord of potential functions.

 The Types of Fishfinder

Dedicated Fishfinders

Dedicated fish finder is a perfect suit for a small boat and kayak for fishing small inland lakes within your limited budget. Those types of fish finders equipped with the bigger display and the most cost-effective performance. It shows you what’s below water in its display. Some dedicated fishfinder you can usually add a GPS sensor later to many units, turning them into chartplotter combos.

Fishfinder/Chartplotter combo.

If you have a big boat than Fishfinder/Chartplotter combo makes sense. Combo units are helpful for most owners of medium boats. You can use GPS for navigation to the fishing grounds, view only the fishfinder or view both on the split screen. Combo unit gives you lots more data underwater environment, bottom structure, vegetation, and fish.

Features

Multifunction Network Systems

All the major manufacturers of the fishfinder provide multi-function network systems. They usually support a huge range of data sources including radar, raster, and vector GPS charts. They have also Bluetooth/ wi-fi features that allow you to control their unit from your iPhone or Android Device. Your fish finder often uses an external module to get all sources of necessary data. Multifunction network systems come with multiple-display which is great for the medium or large boat. Manufacturer of Multifunction network systems updates their device every time increase its capabilities to get the best out of it.

Transmitting power

The power of a fish finder is a very crucial factor to consider before making the purchase. The performance of a fish finder depends on power transition of a fish finder which is directly related to visibility of silt-laden water, depths, and effectively separate targets from down structure. With just only 200 watts you can able to see the shallow water Inland Lake. For Most coastal water, a 500-watt fish finder should have plenty of power. For blue water anglers, you need to take 1,000 watts or more.

 Display (Resolution, size)

A maximum number of vertical pixels mean higher depth resolution, as each pixel represents less depth. The number of pixels in a screen’s horizontal axis determines how long objects stay on screen before they scroll out of view, of significant importance with split-screen displays showing narrow columns of side-by-side information. The higher the screen resolution the more information can fit on the screen.

More pixels per square inch will give you a superior detail of surrounding structures and enhanced split-screen images. You can see the very small detail on high-resolution large screen the air bladders of smaller fish, near the bottom fish, separate targets from one another. Note: the contrast of the display must be sharp in order to use the resolution. Like many features, you get what you pay for with display resolution—the more resolution is the better.

Screen sizes refer to the diagonal (corner to corner) distance in inches across the screen. Widescreen displays show you more meaningful information when you split the screen to display more than one type of data, showing your GPS chart, radar screen, or returns from more than one transducer.

 Frequency of the transducer

The transducer is the heart of any fish finder any system. A transducer is a device that converts electrical energy into sound waves and back again. A transducer sends out sound waves that expand as they travel forming a cone, they bounce off the bottom, structure, and fish. The receiver picks up the returning sonar wave and the sonar unit digitally process the signal to become what you see on screen.

Fishfinders operate into three different type frequencies those are single frequency transducer, dual frequencies, and multiple frequencies. Dual frequencies transducer comes with both 20 and 60-degree cones. Most transducer comes with either 50, 83, 192 or 200 kHz frequencies, all in direct relation to the cone angle.

Higher frequencies give detail resolution on your screen and the perfect view from a fast-moving boat. But don’t penetrate as deeply as lower frequencies. Inland shallow-water anglers generally best for higher frequencies of 200 kHz, 400 kHz or 800 kHz. For maximum depth, use lower frequencies.

• Higher frequency transducers

  send the short length of a wave with more wave cycles per second. High frequencies give you greater detail to detect very small objects over a smaller portion of water. High frequencies show less noise and fewer undesired echoes while showing better target definition.200 kHz works best in water under 200 feet/60 meters and when you need to get an accurate reading while moving at faster speeds.

• Lower frequency transducers

  absorb sound waves at a slower rate for low frequencies and the signal can travel farther before becoming too weak to use. The beam angles are wide at low frequencies, that means it spread out more is better suited for viewing a larger area under the boat. One sound wave at 50 kHz is able to detect fish with large air bladders, slightly longer than an inch. This Lower frequency transducer can see deeper, they may not give you a clear picture of the bottom. Low frequencies use wider beams that help you to find out the large objects where fish hide.

CHIRP Sonar

CHIRP transmit frequency regulated sonar pulses place energy into the water for the long duration. This gadget accomplishes remarkable determination and target recognition by utilizing using digital pattern matching and signal processing. CHIRP (Compressed High-intensity Radar Pulse) is a customary echo sounder that depends on an unmistakable frequency pulse bouncing back off fish or bottom. You can able to identify individual fish and separate fish from the bottom structure is a matter of in inches. Instead, you single mass, you can see individual fish in a group.

CHIRP devices very much capable to transmit both on high and low frequencies simultaneously. The lower frequency gives greater depth penetration with less power consumption than a higher frequency signal generating less noise.

Mounting Options

It is very important to mount the transducer on the boat.

• Through-hull with fairing blocks offers the best performance, especially at higher speeds.
• Through-hull flush mounts are best for trailer boats where good performance is required and there are no protrusions from the hull.
• In-hull transducers do not penetrate the hull but do sacrifice some performance.
• Trolling motor: Clamped to the outside or permanently installed inside propeller hub of trolling motor.
• Transom-mount:adjustable-angle bracket is bolted or screwed to the transom, with transducer hanging below and behind hull. Simpler installation, but may encounter more turbulent water flow.

Why should you need a fishfinder?

First

The first thought might come to your mind of putting a big dollar on some electronics device on the kayak would be awkward and your money goes into the water with one roll of your kayak. Well, digital colorful screen fishfinders are nice, but you don’t need to spend $ 400 to $ 500 to get what you need. A basic fishfinder can give all the features you are looking for.

Second

You know there might your target fish are hiding place but you can’t see from above water. Those devices allow you to see the water bottom and help you to target specific species fish. For the example bass fish’s favorite hiding place is some sinking structure or swimming area of halibut fish, now you can see their places not only that you can see them also. It will be an advantage know the bottom depth, especially when if you are in an unfamiliar area. If it feels fishy about the area you can come back later to it by getting some land references if you don’t have GPS with you. Examine a couple of land reference points and finding the depth where you can put in that area.

Third

Another reason is to locate bait when it is hard to find bait on the surface. Maybe many times bait laid into the water column and can be located by the sounder. When you unable to get bait at your dependable spot, then your fishfinder will be your only useful tool. If you like to dive those are some of the obvious reason why you should invest in a fishfinder. They are some other features that May or may not apply to your specific needs; like changing the transducer scope, dual screen options.

Bottom Line

So, there you have it, guys!  How was the Best Fishfinder? Always remember that when you are buying something valuable like fishfinder. The idea of the best fishfinder will be different for each individual product. A device which is a great option for your friend might not be applicable to you. It depends on your need, test, different features and also the styling device. S

We always recommend is that you take time when looking for the device. We know you will love to get a fishfinder as soon as you can but take a few minutes and think properly on which brand or device will give you a long-term benefit. A huge number of people buy the wrong fishfinder device without thinking their own style. Do not fall their path. We hope the list helps you pick the best fishfinder within your budget. In case you think we missed a good fishfinder device, let us know.