Study app for deck officer and watchkeeping exams
Lights, shapes and buoys. From every angle.
Lanterna trains the part of the exam that is about pictures: navigation lights, day shapes, buoys and collision situations. Realistic scenes by night and by day, never the same picture twice, and the rule behind every answer.
The browser version works on iPhone and on a computer. Same app, same questions.
At night you see these lights. What is it?
- Power-driven vessel, less than 50 m
- Power-driven vessel, 50 m or more
- Vessel towing, length of tow over 200 m
- Vessel restricted in her ability to manoeuvre
Rule 23(a). Two masthead lights, the after one higher, and a green sidelight: you are looking at her starboard side.
The exam shows you a picture. So does Lanterna.
Reading the rules is not the same as recognising a vessel at two in the morning. Lanterna makes you do the recognising, hundreds of times, until it is automatic.
Never the same scene twice
Vessels, buoys and lights are drawn in varied scenery and from different bearings. You learn the pattern, not the picture.
The rule behind every answer
Each question names the COLREG rule, IALA mark or signal it comes from. A wrong answer becomes a lesson instead of a guess.
Your mistakes come back
Questions you got wrong return until you get them right, spaced out over your sessions. The night before the exam you study only what you still miss.
What you can study
Nine categories that cover the visual and signal part of COLREG, IALA and STCW watchkeeping exams.
- Lights and shapes
- Identify vessels by their lights at night and their day shapes, seen from different bearings. COLREG Rules 21 to 31.
- COLREGs
- "What do you do?" situations: crossing, head-on, overtaking, narrow channels and restricted visibility on radar (Rule 19).
- IALA buoyage
- Lateral, cardinal, isolated danger, safe water and special marks in Region A and Region B, plus light characters you time with a stopwatch.
- Sound signals
- Manoeuvring, warning and fog signals, played as sound or shown as pictures.
- Flags and signals
- The single-letter signals of the International Code of Signals, as flags and as meanings.
- Distress and GMDSS
- The distress signals of COLREG Annex IV and the basics of GMDSS.
- Chart symbols
- Wrecks, rocks, lights and abbreviations from INT 1.
- Morse code Free
- Read and send, as with signals by light, including the single-letter meanings. Free for everyone, no purchase needed.
- Final exam
- Everything mixed, against the clock, the way the real paper feels.
How you study
Five ways through the same questions, so you can learn first and test yourself later.
Flashcards
Look, think, flip. No scoring.
Practice
Answer, then read the explanation and the rule.
Test
Timed, no hints. Like the exam.
My mistakes
Only the questions you got wrong, until you do not.
Match pairs
Quick repetition of flags, signals and symbols.
Built for the exam you are sitting
The pictures are the same whichever flag you sail under. Here is where Lanterna fits.
- Philippines OIC-NW
- Lights, buoys, COLREG and signals: the picture questions of the written exam, and extra drills between review-centre sessions.
- India Second Mate (FG) orals, Function 1
- Night cards, day cards, buoys and sound signals, the cards surveyors put on the table in MMD orals. Morse by light for the signals test is free.
- United Kingdom MCA oral exam, Part A
- A large share of the Part A computer test is COLREG and buoyage. Practise the exact recognition it asks for.
- RYA Day Skipper and Yachtmaster
- IRPCS, lights and shapes, buoyage and sound signals for the theory course and the Yachtmaster oral.
- United States USCG licence exams
- Lanterna covers the International Rules (COLREG) and IALA Region B. It does not cover the Inland Rules, so use it for the international part only.
- Everywhere else STCW II/1 watchkeeping
- Any officer of the watch or watchkeeping certificate built on COLREG and IALA, in Europe, Africa or Asia, at home or on board, since it works offline.
One payment, then it is yours
No subscription, no ads, no account, anonymous usage statistics only. Buy it once and study until the exam, and after.
Free
No cost
For everyone, for as long as you like.
- Morse code: read and send, with the single-letter meanings
- Ten trial questions in every other category
- All study modes
Full access
One purchase
Priced for your country in Google Play. Lower in India, the Philippines and most of Asia.
- Every question in every category
- Final exam mode
- Free updates, and new questions as they are added
- Works offline, on the ship too
On iPhone or a computer, use the browser version at app.lanternakonsult.se. The free part is open to everyone. Full access in the browser comes with an access code from your school or training centre.
For schools and training centres
One access code for the whole class. Students open the app in any browser, enter the code and study on their own phones, at home or on board.
- Licence per year or half-year, priced by the number of users and by region.
- Free trial for instructors first. Tell us how many codes you need.
- Your logo and colours in the app, as an option.
- No personal data is stored. Nothing for your data protection officer to review.
- Instructors at maritime academies and RYA training centres in Europe, Africa and Australia are testing it now.
Ask for a trial
One email is enough. Say which exam your students sit and roughly how many they are, and you will get codes for your instructors to test.
robin_rantala@lanternakonsult.seMade at sea
Lanterna is built by a Swedish master mariner who works as chief officer on a ro-pax ferry in the Baltic. It started as a way to drill the lights and buoys that cadets keep missing in exams, and grew into the nine categories above.
Every question is checked against the rule text it comes from, and every question has a report button. If something looks wrong, tell us from inside the app and it gets fixed.
Published by Lanterna Konsult AB, Sweden.