The best kitesurfing YouTube channels

Dozens of channels post kitesurfing footage. About ten of them teach. These are the ones worth subscribing to, and what each is good at.

Kitesurf College

This is the textbook of the sport, now branded Wingfoil, Kitefoil & Kitesurf College since it expanded into foiling and winging. The style is deliberately unglamorous: calm narration, clear on-water footage, and its signature clean animations showing exactly what the bar and the kite are doing at each moment.

Nearly every video runs the same way, technique broken into numbered steps, then a common-mistakes section, which is where the learning actually happens.

Its beginner twintip series is a nine-episode playlist that runs from trainer kites and setup, through safety and self-rescue, to launching and riding: an IKO-style curriculum in video form. Individual tutorials cover the trainer kite, body dragging in all three directions, the waterstart, riding upwind (an original 2016 version and a 2024 extended edition), transitions and jumping.

Best for absolute beginners through early intermediates who want systematic instruction with no hype, and the first stop for twintip riders curious about foil. Kitesurf College on YouTube. Beginner Intermediate

Duotone Kiteboarding Academy

Duotone came out of North Kiteboarding in 2018 and is run from Oberhaching in Germany; the atlas holds 18 Duotone-branded centres and partner schools, from Torbole to Kalpitiya. Its Academy series is short, well shot and demonstrated by professional athletes, most of the beginner videos by Jeremie Tronet, a French pro based on Union Island in the Grenadines who runs his own channel too.

The Academy is organised by discipline and level, with a beginner playlist covering kite preparation, bodydrag, waterstart, first rides and downloop jibes, plus parallel series for freestyle, big air, wave riding and foil.

Its real advantage is the companion app described at the end of this chapter, which arranges more than 250 trick lessons into a progression tree. The videos are brand-produced, so expect Duotone gear in every frame; the technique is gear-agnostic. Best for riders who want a structured progression by discipline and short, dense videos. Duotone Kiteboarding on YouTube.

MACkite and Ride with Blake

MACkite Boardsports runs one of the busiest kiteboarding channels in North America out of two West Michigan lake towns, a lesson site at Pere Marquette Park in Muskegon and a shop in Grand Haven, both on Lake Michigan.

Its instructional core is Ride with Blake, in which team rider Blake Olsen covers beginner and intermediate skills: waterstarts, beach starts, riding upwind, transitions, first front rolls, in a chatty style that feels like a mate coaching you from the beach. His waterstart video breaks the move into five steps and is the friendliest of the four in this chapter.

MACkite also posts a large volume of gear reviews, which makes it the channel to watch while you are buying your first kite.

For reference, its own rates are $199 for a 90-minute beginner lesson (2026) and $299 for a three-hour one (2026), and a complete new setup, a 9–12 m kite, a 135–140 cm twintip, a bar, a harness and a pump, runs $1,800–2,200 in 2026. Best for North American riders, gear research, and learners who take coaching better informally than from a curriculum.

Progression Sports

Progression sold instructional DVDs before YouTube existed and it shows: the videos are the most methodically structured in the sport, built on slow-motion analysis and precise body-position breakdowns.

The free material on YouTube is strongest on surfboard and wave riding, and it feeds the paid Progression Player platform and app, which holds full collections for every level plus wave and foil. Best for intermediate riders ready to pay for depth, for anyone starting waves, and for riders who want coaching-grade analysis instead of vlogs. Intermediate

Steven Akkersdijk and the SA Masterclass

Akkersdijk is Dutch, coaches for a living and rides out of Big Bay in Cape Town. He was a Red Bull King of the Air podium finisher in 2014 and a finalist several times since, and his channel is the best advanced-technique resource on YouTube.

The SA Masterclass series breaks tricks into exercise ladders: the three-part Road to Kiteloops starts with the downloop jibe, so you are comfortable looping the kite low before you ever loop it in the air, then works up through small loop transition jumps to full loops and megaloops.

His most-watched videos are about unglamorous things, line length and kite trim. Best for intermediate and advanced riders chasing bigger jumps and kiteloops, and for anyone who wants to know why a technique works rather than only how. Steven Akkersdijk on YouTube. Advanced

Sam Light

Sam Light is a British pro who rides the south coast of England around Hurst Castle, and his channel mixes high-level riding with useful how-tos. His jumping tutorial is one of the most-referenced first-jump videos in the sport: send, pop, redirect, land tail-first, in a handful of key points. Best for intermediate riders working on jumps and downloops, and on slider and park riding. Sam Light on YouTube. Intermediate

The Kitesurf Centre

The Kitesurf Centre has taught at Camber Sands since 2007, on the kite beach at Jury's Gap and at Greatstone ten minutes away, and it is one of only nine schools in the atlas certified by the BKSA. Its videos mirror the lesson plans: how to fly a trainer kite, how to launch and land, and the safety procedures including the emergency pack-down.

This is what a British instructor says to you on the beach, filmed. Useful before a first lesson anywhere. Camber Sands itself wants about 12 knots for a beginner and 18 for an experienced rider, and the spot page lists that range along with the schools on the beach. Beginner

REAL Watersports

REAL has been teaching on the 40-mile barrier island of Cape Hatteras / Outer Banks, North Carolina since 2001 and has put more than 50,000 students through its kite and surf programmes. Its Introduction to Kiteboarding series is six sequential lessons starting with how to fly a trainer kite, and there is a long how-to playlist behind it covering kitesurfing as well as surf and SUP.

The order it teaches in, trainer kite, then body drag, then board, is the standard American method and the same one its Zero to Hero camp runs on the water. Best for anyone booking a camp-style learning trip, and for structured study before you go. Beginner

Epic Gust

Run from a school in Domaso, at the windy northern end of Lake Como, where the Breva thermal fills in most summer afternoons at 15–18 knots. Epic Gust pairs long-form tutorials with written guides, and its waterstart video claims to be the last waterstart tutorial you will need.

It earns that with the edge cases nobody else covers: light-wind starts, overpowered starts, what to do when the board is gone. Best for learners stuck on one skill who want a 15 to 20 minute walkthrough instead of a four-minute overview.

Tribe Watersports

A Kenyan school on Galu Beach in Diani, 30 km south of Mombasa, teaching under both IKO and BKSA. The channel is worth following for one video: a self-rescue and deep-water pack-down filmed in real open water rather than in a pool.

Galu Beach runs 15–22 knots on the Kaskazi and 18–25 on the Kuzi, so the demonstration is done in wind you would actually be rescuing yourself in. It is the skill most riders neglect until the day they need it.

Also worth knowing

• Jeremie Tronet (JT Pro Center). The Grenadines-based pro behind many Duotone Academy videos runs his own channel of tutorials and tropical freestyle footage.
• Univers Kite. A big French-language channel that aggregates footage and gear tests. More inspiration than curriculum.
• KiteBud. The Perth school, on Pinnaroo Point in the Fremantle Doctor sea breeze, sells online courses including an 11-minute deep-water self-rescue module filmed in real conditions. Beginner lessons there run A$369–A$1,779 (2026).

Two playlists work as complete courses on their own. Start with one of these if you want a single path rather than a pile of individual videos.