What Kit do I need to get into Parawinging?

So you're seeing the foiling world blowing up with Parawings, and all your mates are popping up with them down the beach and flailing around while they begin learning it. Are you keen to try?

We've been involved in this new discipline for almost a couple of years now. It first reared its head in 2024 and it hasn't shut up since. In the same way winging took over our minds back in 2019, Parawinging has done the same in 2026. The kits have improved, it's much more accessible, and the feeling of riding hands-free is addictive.

We might be coming at this differently to some folk—but in our mind, the best thing about Parawinging is getting rid of the bloody thing! It's all about wave and bump riding hands-free. Winging allowed us to get rid of the power of the wing while we rode waves, but parawinging allows us to get rid of anything handheld completely.

If you're at a decent level of your winging and fancy a new challenge—Parawinging is certainly that, and we're all for it.

What Parawinging Gear Do You Actually Need?

Essentially, to begin with, you may well just need the parawing itself. If you're coming at this with a wing foiling background, you may well have a decent enough sized board and foil already.

Think body weight and above for the board, and the same style/size foil you would've learnt to wing on (or your current light-wind option). Consider your abilities properly—how good is your foiling, really? The better you are, the more you can get away with and likely the less you'll need to invest to give it a go.

1. The Wing: What is the Best Parawing to Buy?

This is the product that has advanced the quickest, as it's the newest and most unknown. The first products on the market were poor even by the standards of the day, but Ozone’s Pocket Rocket changed everything—and quickly became THE model to get. It offers great upwind ability, stability, and ease of use on the water.

As of May 2026, we now have the Ozone Pocket Rocket V2 and it has taken everything a stage further—once again cementing itself as the top product in its category.

• Our Recommendation: Honestly, just buy this. Get one to begin with. 

• The Best Size: The 4.3m has been the best-selling size by a million miles as it seems to work best in the range of winds we experience here in the UK most. 

• The Dream Quiver: In an ideal world, having three wings is great—our personal choice is a 3m, 3.6m, and 4.3m—but a 4.3m to begin with will cover a huge amount of bases. For an 80kg rider, these are likely to work roughly between 15 and 25 knots. 

2. The Foil: Stability and Glide are King

To begin with, you want something big, glidey, and floaty that'll get you up early. Beginner wings will work but will get stale quickly if you have solid foil ability already. 

• What We Ride: We chose the AXIS Fireball 1250 on our first runs , but dropped to the 1070 pretty quickly. Now, we're almost solely using the AXIS Surges in a variety of sizes. 

   

• The Sweet Spot: Something along the lines of a 950 or 1010 Surge would work awesomely well. It gives you early lift and plenty of glide, but it's still user-friendly and fun. If you're in the AXIS system, thats your answer - if you're in another brands system - look for something similar - turny and somewhere 8-10ish Aspect ratio.

• Setup Tip: You're going to want something stable when you're just starting out, so if you have a longer fuselage or a larger tail wing, give that a go. If you go all-in using your best high-wind wing setup straight away, you're likely going to have a bad time.

3. The Board: Volume vs. Midlengths

Arguably where we get the most chat—down to the midlength craze that's been taking the world by storm the last couple of years. We've written a bunch about the midlength thing already, so check out our other Blog Posts for more info.

Do you need a midlength for parawinging? No. Do they make things a little easier sometimes? Yes.

To learn the sport, though, it's back to needing volume. More volume = easier to keep stable and get going. If you are coming at this from a wing foil background, we're not saying you need to go as big as you did to learn to wing, but you will want some wiggle room to get to grips with the parawing while you're out in the open water trying to suss it out. 

• The Golden Rule: Body weight in litres plus 20% has always been a solid go-to rule. This might be your current light-wind board, or the one at the back of the garage you've been holding on to to teach your mates to wing. If you're a confident winger - bodyweight will work in the right conditions.

 

• Where do Midlengths actually help? They come in handy to gain extra board speed when you're getting going in lighter conditions. For winging, this lets you get going in a wider range of wind speeds. For Parawinging, this helps you get up at all. Getting a wider, shorter, "traditional" wing board up and going with a parawing and zero skill is going to take some pretty decent wind—and we've not always got that luxury.

 

• One thing worth noting, we're not the biggest fans of riding full blown downwind boards with parawings. Their extra length makes them very 'tracky' and they only want to go in one direction - Downwind. With parawinging, you're often flailing around with the board rotating around in many different directions before you head off crosswind. This might sound daft to begin with - but using a downwind board gives you very little ability to direct the board as well as you need to - and you end up spending a lot of energy dragging the board round to face the direction you want to go in. If you ride straight downwind because thats where your board wants to head, you'll lose the power in the wing. Its doable - its just another thing to frustrate you.

Safety Gear You Shouldn't Skip

While you're dropping the handheld wing, remember you are now attached to a small traction kite. Before you head out, make sure you've sorted:

• Impact Vest & Helmet: Trust us, you will faceplant a few times while learning to manage the lines and your board speed simultaneously. Protect yourself.

Where Should I Go to Try It?

Flat water and decent wind—that's all you need to get going. Our local spot can be super tidal, so we simply wait for slack water.

And the same way we all learnt to wing foil when it was too light to kite, actually going out in proper wind to learn the parawing makes things 10x easier.

There, simple!

Need Advice on the Perfect Parawing Setup?

Not sure if your current foil quiver or light-wind board will cut it - give us a bell. We’ve tested it all, made the mistakes, and we're here to make sure you don’t have to!