Kite Foil

The quietest, fastest way to sail a kite

27 boards · 9 brands · 54 sizes

Kite foiling is kiteboarding on a short board mounted on a hydrofoil, so the rider flies above the water instead of planing on it. It is close to silent and smooth through chop, and it keeps going in winds too light for a twin-tip. It now covers everything from relaxed cruising to Olympic racing (Formula Kite) and record-height big air.

A typical kite foil board, 1100 by 436 mm
the typical outline: every board’s shape averaged at the median length and width

The typical board

The typical kite foil board is 1144 × 450 mm, 13 L, with a round tail and its wide point ahead of centre.

900–1356mm long · median 1144

408–500mm wide · median 450

9–22litres · median 13

2.5length over width, median · derived

Ranges hold the middle 80 % of every size listed · tails: round tail 18, square tail 9

How It Rides

What moves it

The kite pulls the rider, through a harness and control bar, much as in any kiteboarding. The difference is underneath: at low speed the foil's wing makes enough lift to raise the board clear of the water, and once airborne the only drag is the thin mast and wings. That low drag lets experienced riders fly in about 6–10 knots of wind, often on efficient ram-air foil kites, and lets racers reach close to 40 knots.

Reading the shape

The board does not need to plane or turn on its rails, so it shrinks to a platform for the feet and for getting started: freeride kite-foil boards are mostly sold by length, about 90–140 cm, with roughly 11–24 L of volume, and beginners should take the longer end for easier water starts. Race boards are capped by class rules: Formula Kite allows at most 1,550 mm long and 500 mm wide, with a minimum 2,000 g hull. Look for the mast track or box under the back foot and strap inserts. Big-air foilboards are a little thicker; Hugo Wigglesworth's 40 m jump was on a 27 L board. Rule of thumb: a rider under about 68 kg (150 lb) chooses 90–120 cm, 68–90 kg 110–130 cm, over 90 kg 120–140 cm.

How to read any board: length and width, wide point, tails, rails, rocker

Wind

about 6–10 kn for experienced riders; 12–15 kn to learn

Water

flat water to open-sea chop and swell

Worth knowing

The foil smooths out chop, but it needs depth under the mast and room to fall away from it.

The Rack

Every kite foil board, shortest to longest, one scale · from the Naish Hover Micro Chip 2025 (800 mm) to the Gong Kitefoil Catch FSP 2X 2025 (1340 mm)

All 27 in the catalogue

Good To Know

  1. Kiteboarding's Olympic debut, Formula Kite at Paris 2024, was raced at Marseille Marina from 4 to 9 August, with 20 riders from 20 nations in each event. Valentin Bontus (AUT) and Ellie Aldridge (GBR) took gold. The men's opening series was cut short after race 7 because there was too little wind. [1][2]

  2. Team GB describes Formula Kite as capable of up to 40 knots (46 mph), the fastest class in the history of Olympic sailing. World Sailing puts typical downwind speeds at about 30 knots, in races lasting about 12 minutes. [3][4]

  3. On 26 June 2023, at the Prince of Speed event at Le Rouet, Nico Parlier averaged 40.36 knots over the 1,853 m nautical-mile course on a kite foil. [5]

  4. The highest kite jump on record when it was set was done on a foil. On 6 December 2025 at Kite Beach, Cape Town, Hugo Wigglesworth, aged 19, reached 40.0 m on a 27 L foilboard in about 40 knots of wind, measured by a WOO sensor. He was the first kiter to pass 40 m. [6][7]

  5. On 13 August 2016 Nick Levi rode a kite foilboard nonstop for 12 hours on the Sacramento River, covering 254.5 miles at an average of about 25 mph. A year later he set the Guinness record for the longest distance kite surfed in 24 hours: 673.83 km (418.7 mi). [8][9]

  6. On 11 May 2021 Guy Bridge kite-foiled around the Isle of Wight, 100.4 km, in 2 h 24 min, averaging 42 km/h with a top speed of 60.6 km/h. [10][11]

Watch And Read

Who Makes Them

Where And When

Where to watch it

  • Marseille, FranceVenue of the first Olympic kite races, Formula Kite at Paris 2024.
  • Isle of Wight, EnglandThe 100 km round-the-island course is a benchmark for kite-foil distance speed.
  • Weifang, ChinaHosted the first Formula Kite world championship in 2016.

Where it came from

Maui's Manny 'Mango' Carafino built hydrofoil kiteboards in the mid-2000s. At the first US kiteboard nationals in 2007, Chip Wasson's Carafino foil was much faster upwind but slower downwind. French racers adopted foils around 2008. The IKA's Formula Kite class held its first world championship in Weifang in 2016, World Sailing chose it for Paris 2024 in 2018, and in Marseille in August 2024 it produced the first Olympic medals won on hydrofoil kiteboards.

More disciplines

Sources

  1. [1]
  2. [2]
  3. [3]

    Explained: Olympic sailing

    Team GB · tier 1 · federation

  4. [4]

    What is a Formula Kite in Olympic sailing?

    World Sailing (Paris 2024 site), 2024-07-18 · tier 1 · federation

  5. [5]

    Une performance hors normes pour Nicolas Parlier !

    Flysurf.com, 2023-07-07 · tier 2 · article

  6. [6]

    Hugo Wigglesworth's 40-Meter Kite Jump: A New World Record

    IKSURFMAG, 2025-12-11 · tier 2 · article

  7. [7]

    Hugo's WOO World Record Jump 40.0

    Flysurfer, 2025-12 · tier 3 · manufacturer

  8. [8]

    Dr. Nick Levi's Guinness World Record

    IKSURFMAG, 2016-10-19 · tier 2 · article

  9. [9]

    Longest distance kite surfing in 24 hours

    Guinness World Records, 2017-08-11 · tier 1 · record

  10. [10]

    NEW WORLD RECORD Kiting around the Isle of Wight

    IKSURFMAG, 2021-05-19 · tier 2 · article

  11. [11]

    Kite Foiling World Records and Firsts

    Foiling Freaks · tier 3 · reference

  12. [12]

    Formula Kite

    Wikipedia · tier 4 · reference

  13. [13]
  14. [14]

    Kite Foilboard Size Chart

    Windance, 2026-01-19 · tier 3 · article