Updated 2026-09-21
The Fort Lauderdale International Boat Show runs October 28 – November 1, 2026, across seven venues along the New River and the Intracoastal — the Broward County Convention Center, Bahia Mar, Hall of Fame Marina, Las Olas Marina, the 17th Street Yacht Basin, Pier Sixty-Six Marina, and the Superyacht Village at Pier 66 South. It's the largest in-water boat show in the world — more than 100,000 people attend, roughly half from out of state, and the 2025 edition put a reported $1.78 billion into the state economy.¹ For one week, every marina slip within reach of the show is either full or priced like it. This page is about the other option: private docks. YachtNSlip has 144 active dock listings in Fort Lauderdale as of this writing, 63 of them within about 2 miles of Bahia Mar and 114 within about 5 miles — most of them in the 33301 downtown/Las Olas corridor along the New River, the rest spread through the South Fork, Rio Vista fringe, and the barrier-island neighborhoods north and south of the show. None of them are marina slips with a reservation desk. They're private waterfront docks, and asking about one costs nothing.
Across YachtNSlip's 144 Fort Lauderdale listings today, the middle 80% of nightly rates run from about $16 to $157, with a median around $50 — that's the year-round range, not a show-week premium, because YachtNSlip doesn't set prices; owners do, and rates on unclaimed listings are the indicative number we pulled from the public source, not a live quote. A handful of larger private docks list well above that (up to $1,000/night for the biggest listed slips), which tells you the real driver of price here: boat length and water depth, not the calendar. A 25-foot day boat and a 90-foot motor yacht are not competing for the same dock, and neither is competing with a $400/night marina transient slip during show week — a private dock is a different, usually cheaper, category entirely.
The honest caveat: YachtNSlip has zero completed bookings to date, so there's no internal data yet on what these docks actually go for once an owner and boater agree a real price, or how much show week specifically moves that number. Don't treat the listed rate as a quote — treat it as a starting point for the conversation the fit check and inquiry form start for you.
FLIBS marina slips and nearby hotel rooms are well known to sell out months in advance — this show adds 1,300+ vessels and 1,000+ exhibitors across nearly 90 acres of exhibit space,¹ and every marina inside the show footprint gives its transient dockage to the show itself first. YachtNSlip has no internal booking-lead-time data yet (see above), so we won't invent a "book by this date" number. What we can say plainly: the docks nearest the show are private homes, not businesses — owners aren't holding inventory for the show the way a marina does, and the earlier you ask, the more of the 144 listings are still realistically available to answer you before the week arrives.
1. Find a dock in Fort Lauderdale (or one of the neighborhoods above) that fits your dates.
2. Send an inquiry with your boat's length, beam, draft, air draft, and power need — the more specific, the faster and more useful the owner's answer. Mention the show by name and your dates; owners near the show already know why you're asking.
3. YachtNSlip runs the fit check and shows you an indicative quote before you send.
4. The owner answers directly — available, not available, or taken until a date — and if it's a yes, you agree the price and the details between yourselves. YachtNSlip doesn't charge either side.
If nobody answers in a day or two: the listing page has a one-click option to ask nearby docks the same question — you don't have to start over.
¹ Attendance, out-of-state share, economic impact, vessel/exhibitor counts, and exhibit acreage: WLRN public radio reporting on the 2024 and 2025 editions of FLIBS (https://www.wlrn.org/news-in-brief/2024-10-28/fort-lauderdale-international-boat-show-attendance-a and https://www.wlrn.org/business/2025-10-28/fort-lauderdale-international-boat-show-touts-1-8-billion-of-economic-impact) and FLIBS's own 2025 economic-impact release (https://www.flibs.com/press/2025-flibs-global-impact/). Venue names, addresses and 2026 dates confirmed against flibs.com as of 2026-09-21.
Listing counts, geo-proximity counts, zip distribution, and price bands: YachtNSlip's active, published Fort Lauderdale listings on 2026-09-21 (n=144); distance computed from each dock's stored coordinates to Bahia Mar Yachting Center, 801 Seabreeze Blvd.
YachtNSlip has 144 private docks listed in Fort Lauderdale, separate from the show's official marina partners. Availability is not guaranteed and it's a request-to-book process — you ask the owner directly and they confirm.
No — private dock owners near the show set their own availability and reply directly. YachtNSlip doesn't charge a fee to ask.
Across YachtNSlip's 144 Fort Lauderdale listings, the middle 80% of nightly rates run from about $16 to $157, with a median around $50; a handful of larger private docks list up to $1,000/night. Those are year-round listed rates — some estimated from a monthly rate rather than a confirmed daily quote — and the owner sets the real price, so treat the listed rate as a starting point, not a quote.
Yes. Asking is free, there's no membership, and you agree price and payment directly with the owner — YachtNSlip doesn't take a fee.
The owner can mark it not available or taken until a date, and YachtNSlip suggests other nearby docks that fit your boat.