Sailboat

A sailboat, sailing boat or yacht is a boat that has a mast and sails. It moves by using the wind in its sails but it may also have an engine.

Diagram of a sailboat, in this case, a typical monohull sloop with a Bermuda or marconi rig.

An Olympic 470 dinghy class sailboat in a competition. This also shows the spinnaker.

Types

There are a great many different sailboats.

Dinghy

A sailing dinghy is a small boat up to about 7 metres (23 ft.) which usually has a centreboard. It does not have a cabin. Usually, a sailboat has two sails: a mainsail and a jib and sometimes a spinnaker.

Sailing yacht

A sailing yacht is a larger boat with a keel and it normally has a cabin. These types of boats can sail long distances, sometimes even around the world. Sometimes they have only one mast but they can have two or three.

Tall ship

A tall ship is an even larger sailing boat which were used before steam engines were invented. These were used for carrying cargo from port to port in days gone by. Now they are usually used as training ships for young people. A tall ship usually has more than one mast.