You want more boat than a bowrider and less commitment than a cabin cruiser. You want to leave the dock at nine with eight people aboard, run somewhere far enough that the day feels like a trip, and come home without stopping for fuel or apologising to anyone about where they had to sit.
That is the deck-boat brief, and the Sea Ray SDX 290 Outboard is Sea Ray's answer to it.
What SDX Means
Sea Ray runs four sport-boat lines, and they are not simply a ladder from cheap to expensive. SLX is the premium sport boat: tighter, more finished, more standard equipment at the helm. SDX is the capacity line — Sea Ray's own framing for it is capacity, comfort and capability in one package.
In practice that means the SDX 290 Outboard spends its design budget on the things that decide whether a long day works. An open floor plan. Convertible seating that changes what the cockpit is for between morning and afternoon. A wet bar that is standard equipment rather than an option. And a fuel and weight combination that gives it 271 published miles of cruising range — 91 miles more than Sea Ray quotes for the SLX 280 Outboard, its near neighbour in length.
This is the only SDX on our site, so it is worth being clear about what you are choosing. If you want the most finished 31-footer, look at the SLX. If you want the most useful one, keep reading.
Who It's For
The SDX 290 Outboard suits the owner whose day involves a group and a distance. It is yacht certified, which is Sea Ray's capacity classification, and the layout is built around movement — people getting up, going forward, coming back, using the head, going swimming.
It is a day boat. Sea Ray publishes no berth count and does not present it as a weekender. What it does have is a head compartment that is genuinely usable: a portable head, a vanity with a sink, storage for toiletries, non-slip flooring and what Sea Ray calls ample headroom. On a 31-foot open boat, that is the difference between a group that stays out and a group that asks to go back.
Design & Layout
The cockpit is convertible by design. Aft-facing transom loungers recline for lounging or sit up for seating, and an optional transom sunpad replaces them entirely if your afternoons look more like anchoring than travelling. Bow filler cushions and a bow table with dedicated storage are on the option list, as is a teak-overlay cockpit table.
The wet bar is the piece that earns its keep. Sink, faucet, counter space and storage, standard — so food and drink have a home that is not the cooler everybody keeps tripping over. The option list extends it with a 12-volt cockpit refrigerator, a cockpit cool box and an electric grill.
The swim platform carries a stainless four-step ladder, which sounds like a small thing until you have watched adults try to climb a three-step ladder in a chop.
At the helm, dual Simrad touchscreen displays handle navigation and control, with a 12-inch Digital Dash with SmartCraft Connect available. Mercury VesselView Link puts live engine data on the screen, and a FUSION audio system with Bluetooth and Wi-Fi streaming is part of the package.
Performance
Standard propulsion is twin Mercury 200 FourStroke outboards — T-200 hp. Optional propulsion runs to twin Mercury 250 Verado FourStrokes, with or without Joystick Piloting.
Read that last sentence carefully if joystick docking matters to you. On this model the joystick is not standard equipment; it arrives with the 250 Verado upgrade. That is the opposite of the arrangement on the SLX 280 Outboard, where twin 250 Verados with Joystick Piloting are the standard boat. It is a real difference in what you are pricing.
Here is Sea Ray's published specification:
| Specification | Sea Ray's published figure |
|---|---|
| Length Overall | 31'2" |
| Beam | 9'0" |
| Dry Weight | 7,677 lb |
| Fuel Capacity | 131 gal |
| Water Capacity | 20 gal |
| Holding Tank | 10 gal (optional) |
| Draft, trim down | 33" |
| Draft, trim up | 25" |
| Deadrise | 21° |
| Standard Propulsion | Twin Mercury 200 FourStroke outboards (T-200 hp) |
| Optional Propulsion | Twin Mercury 250 Verado FourStroke (T-250 hp), Joystick Piloting available |
| Cruising Speed | 28-29 mph |
| Wide Open Throttle | 54-55 mph |
| Range at cruising speed | 271 mi |
| Range at WOT | 165 mi |
| Capacity | Yacht Certified |
The range row is the headline. 271 miles at cruising speed on 131 gallons is a long way for an open 31-footer, and it is Sea Ray's own published figure rather than a calculation. It is what makes this a genuine day-trip boat — the difference between choosing an anchorage nearby and choosing one because you want to go there.
There is a second figure worth sitting with. Sea Ray publishes 54-55 mph wide open here on standard twin 200s. On the SLX 280 Outboard, three inches longer and a few hundred pounds heavier, Sea Ray publishes 50-52 mph on standard twin 250s. Less power, more speed, more range. Sea Ray does not explain the difference and we are not going to invent an explanation for it — but it is a genuine reason to run the two boats back to back rather than assuming the bigger engine badge wins.
At 21 degrees of deadrise the SDX 290 Outboard has real vee under it, and at 7,677 pounds dry it is light for its length. Light and narrow is what buys the range; it also means the boat rewards someone who trims it properly rather than someone who plants the throttles and hopes.
Ownership
Owner-operated, outboard-powered, and simple to keep. The engines live outside the boat where they can be worked on, and the standard 200 FourStrokes are as mainstream as marine power gets — which matters more than it sounds when you are three hundred miles from home in August.
Note that the 10-gallon holding tank is listed as optional while the 20-gallon water capacity is standard, so decide how you want the head plumbed before you sign the order rather than afterwards.
The SDX 290 Outboard is an SDX Sport Boat, which puts it under Sea Ray's five-year SURPA5S+ bow-to-stern warranty plus a Limited Lifetime Structural Hull/Deck Warranty to the original owner.
Where to Start
Run it against a premium sport boat of the same length on the same day, and pay attention to two things: how the open SDX layout behaves once eight people are actually moving around on it, and whether you miss the joystick at the dock. Then hold Sea Ray's 28-to-29 mph cruise for a proper stretch and read the fuel flow off the Simrad screen yourself, so the 271-mile number stops being a brochure figure and becomes yours.
Talk it through with us: TS@MintedYachts.com, +1 (404) 805-9819, or the form on this page.