What counts as a licence-free boat in Spain?

It is a combination of hull length and engine power, and the threshold is set nationally rather than by the rental company or by the island. Boats under those limits may be operated after a short practical briefing from the operator. The figures are revised from time to time, so ask for the exact length and horsepower of the boat you are being offered and confirm the current limit with the operator and the maritime authority before you book.

How far can I go in one?

The contract, not the boat, decides. Small hulls are certified for a stated distance from a sheltered shore and the rental agreement usually repeats that as a hard limit, commonly a small number of miles. Around Ibiza that still gives you the whole of a coastline — Sant Antoni bay and the calas either side of it, or the run between Santa Eulària and Cala Llonga — but it does not give you an island circumnavigation.

Can I take a licence-free boat to Formentera?

No, and any operator who says yes is selling you a problem. The Es Freus crossing puts you well offshore, in a shallow channel with heavy fast traffic, in a hull with limited freeboard and no shelter. It is also outside the area clause in virtually every licence-free contract on the island, which means you are uninsured from the moment you leave.

Is there a minimum age?

There is, it is set nationally, and operators frequently add their own higher limit on top. Only the person named on the contract may drive on most agreements, so if two of you want to share the helm, say so at booking rather than swapping seats out of sight of the jetty.

What does a day cost?

Typically from around a hundred and fifty euros a day in the shoulder months for the smallest hulls, rising to two or three times that in the first three weeks of August, with fuel and a deposit on top. Half days are usually about two thirds of the full-day rate, which makes the morning slot the best value on the price list.

Licence-free boat hire on Ibiza, and where you may take it

You can rent a boat on this island without a certificate, on a briefing and a signature. The limits that come with it are geographic, not theoretical: a distance from shore, a daylight clause, and an area that stops well short of Formentera. What the small hulls will do, and the three legs that are worth doing.

The phrase used on the jetties here is “no licence needed”, and it is true in the same way that “no experience needed” is true of a hire car. There is a class of small, low-powered boat that a competent adult may take out after a twenty-minute briefing, and on an island shaped like this one that class of boat is genuinely useful. What comes with it is a set of limits that are geographic rather than bureaucratic, and those are the part worth reading.

What the exemption actually is

Two numbers define it: how long the hull is and how much power is on the back. Both thresholds are set nationally, not by the operator and not by the island, and they have been adjusted before. Ask for the boat’s length in metres and the engine’s rating in horsepower, then check those against the current rule with the operator and the maritime authority. A briefing is not a certificate, and the person handing you the keys is not the person who wrote the regulation.

What you are given at handover is a practical brief: start and stop the engine, trim, the kill cord, how the anchor works, the limits on the contract, and a phone number. Take it seriously. It is the only instruction you will get, and the anchoring part of it matters more here than almost anywhere.

What you get for the money

Hull	Realistic use	Comfortable for	Where it stops working
Small open dayboat, sub-planing	Pottering between two calas	4 adults	Any chop at all; it is a slow boat
Planing open boat at the top of the band	A coast in a day	5–6 adults	Punching home into an afternoon westerly
Small RIB	Beach landings, shallow water	4–5 adults	Sun exposure; there is no shade whatsoever
Pontoon or terrace boat	Flat water, families, a table	6–8 adults	Anything outside a sheltered bay

None of these is fast. A licence-free hull cruises at a speed that gets you between neighbouring calas in fifteen or twenty minutes and no further in an hour. That is the correct expectation and it is enough for the trips below.

A rigid inflatable pulled up on the pebbles of a small cove below low cliffs, bow line ashore, clear shallow water behind it. — Beaching a rented hull is not automatically allowed. Some contracts prohibit it outright, and stones do more damage than sand.

Three legs that are actually in range

The Sant Antoni coast, north. Out of the bay, past Cala Gració, up to Cala Salada and the water off Punta Galera. Twenty-five minutes each way at cruising speed. Salada is markedly easier to reach by sea than by road in high summer, and that is the strongest single argument for hiring a small boat here at all.

The Sant Antoni coast, south. Cala Bassa, then the shallow turquoise shelf off Cala Conta and the islets. Half an hour out. This is the best water on the west side and the licence-free band gets you to all of it.

Santa Eulària to Cala Llonga and back. Flat, sheltered from the prevailing west, and much quieter than the other coast. Es Canar and the small calas north of the marina are the other direction. This is the run to pick if there are children aboard or if anyone is nervous.

What is not in range: Formentera, the north coast beyond Cap Nunó, Es Vedrà from anywhere on the west, and a lap of the island. All of them are further than they look, all of them put you outside the contract, and two of them put you on a lee shore with no shelter for miles.

The clauses people break without noticing

Distance from shore. Stated in the contract in miles. Drifting out to look at the islets off Cala Conta is closer to the limit than it feels.
Daylight only. Nearly universal on this class. The boat must be alongside before dusk, not heading home at dusk.
Named driver. One person signs, one person drives. Swapping is a breach on most agreements even if nothing happens.
Weather recall. The base can call the fleet in. On the west coast in June they use it.
Anchoring. The one with financial consequences after you have gone home, because penalties for anchoring in protected seabed attach to the boat and come back to the owner. See anchoring over posidonia.

Each of these voids cover for the whole trip, not just for the moment of the breach, which is why the deposit conversation and the limits conversation are really the same conversation — what a charter deposit covers goes into how that plays out.

Which base, and when

Sant Antoni has the most hulls and the shortest notice, and it also has the afternoon breeze; the timing argument is set out in renting a speedboat in Sant Antoni. Santa Eulària has fewer boats, calmer water and easier parking. Ibiza town and Talamanca sit in between and are the most expensive of the three, largely because of what a berth costs there.

Book a morning half day rather than a full day the first time. Nine to one is flat water, empty calas and roughly two thirds of the price. If the boat turns out to be the best part of the week, extend it the following day — small-boat availability outside the first three weeks of August is usually there at twenty-four hours’ notice, which is not true of anything larger.

The one situation where a licence-free boat is the wrong tool: when what you actually want is to get to a cove with no road. Those are mostly on the north and west coasts, exposed and further out, and the right answer there is a tender or a RIB with a skipper rather than a slow hull at the edge of its permitted area.