BOULDER CITY, Nev.—Arc Boats’ sales pitch for electrifying sport boats can start with how fast they accelerate on the water, but many of its advantages only surface at a dock.
“They solve so many acute pain points of boat ownership,” co-founder and CEO Mitch Lee said during a demo of the Arc Sport on Lake Mead here.
Like electric vehicles, electric vessels like Arc’s sport boats or Candela’s hydrofoils require vastly less maintenance because of their simpler powertrains. They also demand much less preparation for winter storage, without the lengthy winterization checklist needed to protect an internal combustion engine’s parts over the offseason.
And like many of the best electric cars, the 23-foot-long Arc Sport accelerates with authority. After a tranquil cruise away from the dock and out of the lake’s no-wake zone—with the boat’s engine making almost no noise—shoving its throttle forward turned it into a different beast.
A rush of torque through the 500-horsepower propeller launched the boat forward so quickly that another journalist on the demo, Chris Castellino of Cheddar News, literally got thrown back into me (and was then delighted that the GoPro he’d stuck to the windshield captured the moment).
We then banked sharply through a series of turns, slashing back and forth like a fighter jet—exceeding 30mph on a boat felt much faster than it would in a car, much less hitting 40mph. I may or may not have had a white-knuckle grip on the nearest parts of the boat at the time.
The use case for the Arc Sport isn’t just going very fast but towing water skiers and generating a wave for surfers, so Lee then demonstrated how you can use the boat’s primary touch-screen to select software presets to leave a wave to the boat’s left or right.
(Credit: Arc Boats)
You can also use the displays to bring up video from the boat’s three cameras: one on the bow, one on the transom at its stern, and a third positioned atop the hardtop lid covering much of the deck that you can raise or lower with touch-screen commands.
The Arc Sport has a massive 226 kWh battery pack, which Lee said wouldn’t have been possible until automakers started making larger batteries for oversized EVs like GMC Hummer EV SUV. Arc says the Sport can operate for more than 24 hours at a no-wake speed and estimates four to six hours at “active usage.”
The Arc Sport uses the same charging port as many non-Tesla EVs. (Credit: Rob Pegoraro)
Added Lee: “In practice we usually exceed that.”
A low-speed J1772 charging port hides under a sealed cap on the Sport’s starboard side. The CEO said faster charging isn’t necessary given how people will not spend all day waterskiing or surfing (“they get tired”). Meanwhile, 240V shore-power hookups aren’t hard to come by at marinas.
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Two underwater thrusters allow finer positioning and can spin it or walk it sideways. The boat also includes multiple storage compartments under its well-padded seats and a set of JL Audio speakers arrayed around the boat to treat passengers to the yacht rock of their choice. Software updates can add some new features; for example, Arc plans to add the ability to record video from those cameras.
You will need to be in at least the lower-income range of the yacht demographic to get this boat. A “Founders’ Fleet” configuration for sale today costs $332,000; Los Angeles-based Arc just shipped its first to a customer. A configuration for delivery from the summer of 2026 onward will start at $258,000.
Founded in 2021 and now employing more than 100 people whose backgrounds include experience at SpaceX, Tesla, and Rivian, Arc has plotted a course somewhat similar to the Tesla journey that began with the two-seat Roadster. Arc first built a small electric speedboat, the Arc One, and is now building a larger vessel with the Arc Sport, with plans to expand beyond that.
The company has a mission statement with the ambition you might expect of a venture-backed startup that’s raised $100 million so far: ensuring that “everything that floats is electric.” It will need to put a lot more boats into the water to make that happen.
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About Rob Pegoraro
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