Pricing
The software is free. The platform is open-source. There are no tiers, no premium upgrade, no "32°N Plus." Whether you use my hosted instance or run the whole stack yourself, the price is the same.
It's free because this is a personal project I'm sharing — not a commercial product I'm building.
What's free
The whole suite of apps, the bus, the AI gateway, the App Store, the cloud services, and the source code. There aren't tiers. There isn't a free version and a paid version. There's one product and it's free.
You can run it three ways — use my hosted cloud, run the platform in your own cloud, or self-host the whole thing on your own hardware. All three are free. The code is identical under all three.
What costs money to run yourself
The platform is free. The physical hardware on your boat isn't software — and I don't sell it. Here's an honest, itemised list of what you'll actually spend to self-host:
If you use my hosted cloud instance instead of self-hosting, the hardware cost drops to the gateway alone — the Mac mini isn't required for the cloud path. Still no software subscription.
Bring-your-own-key
Some apps can connect to paid third-party services if you want them — premium weather routing, satellite communications, or high-resolution chart data. These are all optional. The free defaults cover most cruising cases.
You bring your own API key from the provider. You pay them directly. I never see your usage, your billing, or your key. 32°N just passes the key through to the API. The AI gateway is not BYOK — AI runs as part of the 32°N cloud service, included with the platform.
PredictWind, Stormglass. Higher-resolution models and extended routing windows beyond what ECMWF and NOAA provide free.
Iridium, Starlink, Inmarsat. If you're already paying for a satcom contract, 32°N can route syncs and alerts over it.
Vector charts from C-MAP, Navionics, or other commercial providers. Redistributable chart sources (ODbL, OGL, public domain) are hosted by 32°N and included free.
If you don't bring a key, the free providers — NOAA, ECMWF, Open-Meteo, OpenStreetMap, OpenSeaMap — are the default. They are genuinely good for offshore cruising.
Why it's a commitment, not a structural guarantee
32°N is licensed under MIT — one of the most permissive open-source licences in common use. MIT doesn't legally stop me from building a paid version or restricting how the code can be used. It keeps the source open; the commitment to "free forever" is mine, personally.
I considered AGPL — a stricter licence that would have legally prevented monetisation via its SaaS clause. I picked MIT because the protection AGPL gives conflicts with the Apple App Store distribution model, which matters for reaching most boat owners. The trade was "structural guarantee against monetisation" vs "App Store reach." I picked reach.
If you don't trust the personal commitment, MIT gives you the escape hatch: fork the code, run your own copy. MIT permits that explicitly. Same source, same stack, no permission required.
What you won't see
Things that are off the table. Permanently, not just for now.
Not now, not later. There is no 32°N recurring charge. MIT doesn't legally bind me to that — it's a personal commitment, and if you don't trust it, fork the code and run your own copy. Same source, same stack, no permission required.
There is no "32°N Pro" or "32°N Plus" or any gated feature set. One product, one price, which is zero.
You can export your data. You can self-host. You can fork the code. Your boat data doesn't live inside a proprietary system only I control.
Not a business model I'm interested in. I built this for my own boat. The product doesn't need to monetise the people who use it.
The AI gateway is part of the platform. I pay the inference cost for my hosted instance. AI features are not a separate paid tier.
What's listed as free above is actually free — no credit card required, no trial that expires, no feature you discover is locked after you've integrated the platform.
MIT — every line is public. Run my hosted instance, or fork it and run your own.