The question came up in the bar at Camaret last summer, the way these things always do, three boats deep into a conversation about who had what aboard. One skipper had a full EPIRB in a hydrostatic cradle by the companionway. Another had a PLB clipped to his lifejacket and nothing else. Both were convinced they had made the right call, and the odd thing is they were both partly right. The choice between an EPIRB and a PLB for cruising France is less about which is better and more about what you are protecting against, and where.
Let me set out what actually separates the two, because the marketing blurs it.
What the two beacons actually do
Both transmit on 406 MHz into the Cospas-Sarsat satellite network, the same global system that triggers a coordinated search and rescue response. In French waters that alert lands with the relevant CROSS station, which runs the rescue and tasks the SNSM lifeboats or a helicopter. The signal itself is identical in principle. The differences are physical and administrative.
An EPIRB (Emergency Position Indicating Radio Beacon) is registered to the boat. It is bigger, it carries a ten-year battery, and once activated it transmits for at least 48 hours. Many models float and can be set to deploy automatically from a hydrostatic release when the boat sinks past about four metres, which is the scenario where nobody is left conscious to press a button.
A PLB (Personal Locator Beacon) is registered to a person. It is small enough to live in a lifejacket pocket, the battery is rated for around six years in storage, and once you fire it the minimum transmission time is 24 hours rather than 48. A PLB does not float as standard and will not deploy itself. It works when you work it.
That 24-versus-48-hour figure matters more than people assume. A Biscay rescue tasked at night in a gale is not always a quick affair, and the extra day of beacon life is exactly the margin you want when the weather is slowing the helicopter down. If you want the longer-form picture of why that margin exists, the biscay passage planning write-up walks through how long these passages really take.
The registration trap, post-Brexit
Here is the part that trips up British visitors. From 2026 the UK regulations require any EPIRB or 406 MHz PLB carried aboard a UK-registered pleasure vessel to be registered, and registration is free through the UK Beacon Registry run by the Maritime and Coastguard Agency. An unregistered beacon still transmits, but the rescue services lose the single most useful thing a registration gives them: your boat details, your shore contacts, the description that lets them confirm a real emergency in minutes instead of hours.
For non-UK boats the principle is the same even if the registry differs. Register the beacon in the flag state, keep the paperwork aboard, and update the contact details before a long cruise. This sits alongside the broader French safety paperwork that the gendarmerie can check, covered in the epirb plb registration france guide, which is worth reading before you cross the Channel rather than after.
A point I learned the expensive way: if you sell the boat or change your phone number, update the registry. A beacon registered to a number that rings out is half a beacon.
Cost, and where the money goes
Prices move, but the 2025 to 2026 picture in the UK and France runs roughly like this. A GPS-enabled EPIRB with a ten-year battery starts around 600 to 700 euros and climbs past 800 for models that add AIS and Return Link Service, the feature that pings your beacon to confirm the alert has been received. A PLB sits lower, typically 250 to 400 euros depending on whether it carries AIS.
The hidden cost is the battery replacement at end of life, which for an EPIRB is often a service-centre job rather than a kitchen-table swap, so factor that into the ten-year sum. A PLB is usually cheaper to re-battery but has the shorter six-year cycle, so over two decades the running costs are closer than the headline price suggests.
GPS is the one feature I would not skip on either. Without it the satellites still find you, but the search box can be several nautical miles across. With an integrated GPS the position drops to a small circle, which on a dark night off the Chenal du Four is the difference between a fast pickup and a long, cold wait.
So which one, and where I fit them
My own answer is not one or the other. It is both, sized to the cruising.
For coastal hops along Brittany or the Atlantic shore, a PLB on the skipper's lifejacket covers the most likely accident, which is a person in the water rather than a boat going down. The man-overboard scenario is the one that kills people in tidal water, and a beacon that is already on your body when you fall off is worth more than a perfect EPIRB still in its bracket. The lifejackets meeting french rules piece covers how to integrate the beacon into the harness so it does not snag.
For anything offshore or committing, the canals aside, I want the EPIRB too, in a float-free hydrostatic cradle near the main hatch where it can deploy itself if the boat founders and nobody is left to act. Pair that with a choosing liferaft french coastal decision, because the beacon and the raft are the same plan: stay alive long enough to be found.
If budget forces a single choice, buy the PLB first. It addresses the commonest emergency, it goes everywhere with you including onto a friend's boat or up a mountain, and registration costs nothing. Add the EPIRB when the cruising grows teeth.
AIS and return link: are the extras worth it
Two features now appear on the higher-end beacons and both are genuinely useful in French coastal waters. The first is built-in AIS. A beacon with AIS does not just call the satellites; it also transmits a local distress position that any AIS-equipped boat within VHF range can see on its plotter. On the busy Channel approaches or the crowded summer Riviera that local alert can put a nearby yacht alongside you faster than any helicopter, because the boat that sees your AIS mark is already on the water a mile away. For man-overboard in particular, where minutes in cold tidal water count, AIS is the feature I would pay extra for.
The second is Return Link Service. An RLS beacon receives a confirmation from the satellite system that your distress alert has been picked up, usually shown as a small light on the unit. It changes nothing about the rescue, but it changes everything about the morale of a frightened crew, because you stop wondering whether anyone heard you. On a long night offshore that reassurance is worth real money.
Neither feature replaces the basic 406 MHz function, and a plain GPS beacon still gets you found. But if the budget stretches, AIS first, RLS second, is the order I would add them in for the French coast.
A few practical habits
Test the beacon using its self-test function, not by transmitting a live distress signal. A false 406 MHz alert launches a real rescue and wastes the resources you may one day need.
Check the hydrostatic release date on an EPIRB cradle. The release unit expires on its own schedule, often two years, separate from the beacon battery, and an expired release will not deploy when the boat sinks.
Keep the GPS feature switched on and the beacon where you can reach it from the helm and from the water. A locked beacon in a cockpit locker has saved nobody.
The Camaret debate never reached a verdict, which is fine, because the honest answer is that the two beacons solve different problems. Decide what you are most likely to face on your patch of French coast, fit for that, and register whatever you buy before you slip the lines.
