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Rules · Florida

Where you may not anchor

F.S. 327.4109since 19 May 2025

Not within 150 feet of a marina, boat ramp or boatyard, not within 500 feet of a superyacht repair facility, and not within 300 feet outward from the marked boundary of a public mooring field.

Last checked 21 Oct 2026Not legal advice.

Three distances, measured from the shore side

Florida does not set a general ban on anchoring. It sets distances, and they are all measured from something built: a marina, a boat ramp, a boatyard or another public launching or loading facility; a repair facility for very large yachts; and the marked boundary of a public mooring field.

The figures are in the margin. What matters on the water is where the tape starts. For the mooring field it starts at the marked boundary and runs outward, so a field whose boundary lies well off its pontoons pushes the line further out than the pontoons suggest. For the others the section names the facility, not a line drawn around it.

The exception that carries a second figure

Subsection (2) is the one you read when something goes wrong. It lets a vessel anchor inside the prohibited distance after a mechanical failure, and while a hurricane or tropical storm warning covers the area. For the marina, the ramp and the superyacht facility it repeats the same distances as subsection (1). For the public mooring field it does not: there it names 100 feet.

Both figures stand in the same section of the 2026 statutes, and both were read at the source. This guide prints both and does not say which one governs — that is a question for the paragraph, or for whoever would write the citation.

What the section does not do

It says nothing about how long you may lie in one spot: that is the long-term anchoring permit, which has a page of its own. It says nothing about the night-time areas in Broward and Miami-Dade. And it sets no amounts; a breach is a noncriminal infraction and the penalty section carries the figures.

Read the section itself before it matters. The link in the margin goes to the 2026 text on flsenate.gov, which is where every figure on this page was read.

Worth knowing

  • The 300 feet run outward from a boundary. Not from the nearest moored boat and not from a dock, but outward from the marked boundary of the public mooring field.F.S. 327.4109(1)(a)3.
  • Subsection (2) names a different figure for the same field. The paragraph that lets a vessel anchor there anyway after a mechanical failure, or while a hurricane or tropical storm warning is up, measures 100 feet outward from a public mooring field boundary. It repeats the 150 and the 500 feet unchanged and changes only this one. Whether that is deliberate or an editing slip, the text does not say, and this page does not decide it.F.S. 327.4109(2)
  • Each exception has its own end. After a mechanical failure the vessel may lie there up to 5 business days or until the repair is done, whichever comes first. In weather it is tied to the warning: the exception runs while the hurricane or tropical storm warning for the area is in force.F.S. 327.4109(2)
  • Some vessels are outside the section altogether. Governmental vessels, construction and dredging vessels at a permitted site, commercial fishing vessels actively fishing, and recreational vessels whose crew is tending fishing or netting gear.F.S. 327.4109(1)(b)
  • A breach is a noncriminal infraction. The section makes it one and sends the penalty to s. 327.73; the amounts stand in that section, not in this one.F.S. 327.73
  • This section says where, not how long. 327.4109 measures distances. How long a vessel may lie in one place is a different section, with a permit of its own.F.S. 327.4109 The long-term anchoring permit
  • In some water the night is closed as well. The bill that raised the mooring-field distance also designated sections of Biscayne Bay as anchoring limitation areas, where anchoring is prohibited overnight.ch. 2025-39 Anchoring limitation areas at night

What changed on this rule

  1. 19 May 2025
    CS/CS/HB 481 · ch. 2025-39
    Anchoring distances and Biscayne Bayin force

    Increases the prohibited anchoring and mooring distance near public mooring fields, designates specified sections of Biscayne Bay in Miami-Dade County as grandfathered-in anchoring limitation areas, and restricts local regulation of vessels outside the marked boundaries of mooring fields in certain counties. The bill page gives the effective date as 5/19/2025.

    State law

Questions

Is the 300 feet measured from the mooring field or from the boats lying in it?

From the marked boundary of the field, outward. That is how F.S. 327.4109(1)(a)3. words it.

My engine failed inside one of these distances. Then what?

Subsection (2) lets a vessel anchor there after a mechanical failure for up to 5 business days or until the repair is done, whichever comes first. For a public mooring field that subsection measures 100 feet, not 300.

So which figure governs at a mooring field, 300 feet or 100 feet?

This page does not answer that. Both stand in the 2026 text of the same section: 300 feet in subsection (1)(a)3. and 100 feet in subsection (2). Read the section at the link in the margin, and where it matters, ask the authority that would act on it.

Does this apply inside the mooring field too?

The section covered here measures distances from the outside of the field. It is not the page for the contract you need to lie on a mooring; that is the field operator's.

Sources & checks

Written by buoya editorial from the sources above. Every figure was checked against its source on 21 Oct 2026. Found something wrong? Report a correction.