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As the Dutch found dominance in sea power during the 17th century, the early yacht became a pleasure craft used mostly by royalty and secondly by the burghers for the canals and then in the protected and unprotected waters of the Low Countries. Racing yachts was incidental, coming out of private matches. English yachting started with King Charles II of England during his exile in the Low Countries. On his reaffirmation to the English monarchy in 1660, the city of Amsterdam presented him with a 20-metre (66-foot) pleasure boat with a beam (maximum width) of 5.6 m (18 feet), which he named Mary. Charles and his brother James, the duke of York (James II, reigned 1685–88), ordered for more yachts and in 1662 raced two of them from the Thames, from Greenwich, to Gravesend, and returning, on a £100 wager. Yachting became fashionable among the rich and nobility, but after that point the habit did not last.

The first yacht club in the British Isles, the Water Club, was started in about 1720 at Cork, Ire., as a cruising and unofficial coast guard organization, and held great naval panoply and rigour. The closest thing to a race was the “chase,” when the “fleet” pursued a fictional enemy. The club went on, largely as a social club, until 1765, and in 1828, by conglomerating with other organisations, it was known as the Cork Yacht Club (later the Royal Cork Yacht Club).

Yacht racing was first seen in some ordered method on the Thames around the mid-18th century. The duke of Cumberland founded the Cumberland Fleet for Thames racing in 1775. When George IV came to sovereignty in 1820, it was then known as the Fleet to His Majesty’s Coronation Sailing Society. The Thames Yacht Club seceded following a racing dispute, to become the Royal Thames Yacht Club in 1830. The first English yacht society had been started at Cowes on the Isle of Wight in 1815, and royal funding made the Solent - the strait between the mainland and the Isle of Wight - the continued setting of British yachting. The association at Cowes became the Royal Yachting Club, likewise at the ascension of George IV. Every member was required to have boats of at least 20 tons (20,321 kg). Sailing races for high bids were held, and the social life was lovely. It came to be that the Royal Yachting Club boats were raised in size to more than 350 tons.

In North America, yachting began with the Dutch in New York in the 17th century and went on when the English gained power. Sailing was for the most part for pleasure and found its high point in George Crowinshield’s Cleopatra’s Barge (1815), which sailed on the Mediterranean Sea and set a benchmark of luxury and sophistication for the later yachts in that area from the late 19th century. The first persisting American yacht organisation, the Detroit Boat Club, was formed in 1839. In 1844, John C. Stevens founded the New York Yacht Club while aboard his schooner Gimcrack.

Kinds of sailboats
Early sailing yachts were within the design of such naval craft as brigantines, schooners, and cutters from the 17th century until the latter half of the 19th century. The craft of sizeable yachts was initially largely affected by the success of America, which was drawn by George Steers for a club headed by John C. Stevens, and it was the boat for which the America’s Cup (q.v.) had its namesake after its victory at Cowes in 1851. The first yachts were not designed and built in a contemporary sense, with only a model for an outline. Not until the second half of the 19th century did what was called naval architecture come into action. Not until the 1920s did the use of the science of aerodynamics do for the design of sails and rigging what it had earlier done for hulls.

Because almost all sailboats were individually built, there came a need for handicapping boats as this was before the one-design class boats were made. Therefore, a rating rule was decreed, which is found in the International Rule, taken on in 1906 and edited in 1919. In modern times, one of the rapidly blossoming areas in sailing is that of one-design class boats. All boats in a one-design class are manufactured to the same dimensions in length, beam, sail area, and other aspects (for an example of a two-person sailboat, see illustration). Racing between such boats can be had on an even playing field with no handicapping necessary. A prime example is the uniform International America’s Cup Class taken on for participants in the 1992 America’s Cup race.

As long as yachting was an activity primarily for the royal and the wealthy, cost was no issue, and the size of boats grew, in both length and weight. The rise and popularity of smaller yachts occurred in the latter half of the 19th century out of the sailing of the Englishmen R.T. McMullen, a stockbroker, and E.F. Knight, a barrister and journalist. A voyage around the world (1895–98) captained single-handedly by the naturalized American captain Joshua Slocum in the 11.3-metre Spray proved the hardiness of less sizeable yachts. Following this in the 20th century, notably after World War II, smaller racing and pleasure yachts became more popular, down to the dinghy, a preferred training boat, of 3.7 m. In the late 20th century, yachts of less than 3 m were traveled in single-handedly across the Atlantic Ocean.

Kinds of power yachts
After the decade 1840–50, at which point steam began to replace sail power in public craft, the steam engine, and later the internal-combustion engine, were favoured increasingly in pleasure yachts. Bigger power yachts were progressed to a high standard, and long-distance sailing became a fond activity of the rich. The first power yachts were paddle-wheel boats; those then made way to yachts powered by the fully submerged screw or propeller type of propulsion. As in the case of naval and merchant vessels, auxiliaries carrying both sail and power were the yacht archetype for a number of years. By the later half of the 20th century, many yachts were still auxiliaries, but the larger part were solely power yachts with gasoline or diesel engines.

During the last decade of the 19th century there was a boom in the manufacture of large steam yachts. In particular of these was the Mayflower (1897) of 2,690 tons, that had triple-expansion engines, twin screws, and a compartmented iron hull, and was operated by a crew of at least 150. The Mayflower, bought by the United States Navy in 1898, was the official yacht of the president of the United States until 1929 and gave active service for World War II.

As larger and more dependable internal-combustion engines were developed, many large yachts were using them for power. The creation of the diesel engine, with heavy oil for fuel, advanced from World War I. From the decade after, bigger power-yacht manufacture flourished, climaxing in the Orion (1930) at 3,097 tons. During that period the best auxiliary yacht built was the four-masted, steel, barque-rigged Sea Cloud (1931) of 2,323 tons.

The building of larger power craft declined in 1932, and the trend thereafter was toward smaller, less expensive craft. After World War II, many small naval vessels were sold to private owners for conversion to yachts. In the late 20th century, yachting is a globally loved competition enjoyed by thousands of yachtsmen individually owning and maintaining their own small leisure craft. The popularity of yachts and sailors is increasing steadily, not only in the traditional locations on the sea but also on inland waterways and lakes.

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