What are Foresight+ and Premier, and what do they cost?

In summary

Foresight+ is Foresight's membership, and Premier is its course software. You need both working together to play courses on a Foresight launch monitor such as the GC3. Foresight+ comes in three tiers: Free, Silver at $199 a year and Gold at $599 a year. Courses are a separate add-on: Course Pass at $295 a year for 35 courses, or Course Pass Pro at $595 a year for 111, and both need Silver or Gold. So the cheapest way to play courses is $494 a year. Foresight only publishes US dollar prices, so I've left them in dollars.

What Premier is

Premier is Foresight's newest simulation software. It's where you play full courses, on a Windows PC, with 4K course graphics. It runs on Windows 10 or 11 (64-bit) only; there's no iPad or Mac version. On a phone or iPad you use the Foresight app instead, which shows your shot data and practice sessions but doesn't play courses. Foresight lists Premier for the Falcon, GC3, GC3S, GCHawk, GCQuad and QuadMAX, and Bushnell's Launch Pro and LPi.

Premier needs a reasonably strong PC. Foresight's Premier page gives a minimum of an RTX 3060 Ti or 4060 Ti with 8GB of graphics memory, a Core i5-12500 and 16GB of memory for 1080p. What PC you need has the full figures.

What Foresight+ is

Foresight+ is the membership that decides which features you get, in the app and in Premier. One membership covers both, and it belongs to your Foresight account, not to the launch monitor.

Free

• Core shot data in the app and in Premier.
• History of your last 10 sessions.
• Not eligible for Course Pass, so no course play.

Silver: $199 a year

• Everything in Free, with unlimited session history.
• Dispersion, Tags and Zones views, which show where your shots finish and group them.
• Two drills (Ladder Drill and Target Practice) and Challenges.
• Eligible for Course Pass or Course Pass Pro.

Gold: $599 a year

• Everything in Silver.
• Swing video capture, multiple player profiles, drills with course overlays and earbud narration.
• Third-party integrations. Foresight says Gold members can buy and use GSPro, with a separate GSPro subscription. Silver and Free can't.

Course Pass and Course Pass Pro

Courses are bought on top of Silver or Gold. Both passes give full course play in Premier.

• Course Pass: $295 a year, 35 courses. Foresight's own catalogue includes Muirfield Village, Marco Simone and Quail Hollow.
• Course Pass Pro: $595 a year, 111 courses. The extra courses include Pebble Beach, Royal Troon, Bethpage Black, Celtic Manor's Twenty Ten, Woking and The Grove.

St Andrews isn't in the catalogue, in case you were counting on it.

What it costs in practice

Every combination, per year, at Foresight's prices:

• Data only, no courses: Free, $0. Silver for history and drills, $199.
• Courses on a budget: Silver plus Course Pass, $494.
• All 111 courses: Silver plus Course Pass Pro, $794.
• All courses plus GSPro: Gold plus Course Pass Pro, $1,194, then GSPro's $250 on top, so $1,444.
• GSPro only, no Premier courses: Gold, $599, plus GSPro's $250, so $849.

Foresight bills yearly and the membership renews automatically on your card unless you cancel. Foresight says membership sales are final, so there are no refunds.

The free trial

Every new Foresight device comes with a 30-day trial of Foresight+. The Foresight+ homepage says the trial covers Course Pass too. Foresight doesn't say which tier the trial is, so check what you have in the app before the 30 days end. Use the trial to decide whether you want courses at all, and whether Course Pass is enough.

If you already have FSX

Older GC3s came with FSX Play, which didn't need a subscription. Foresight says any FSX licence (Play, Pro or 2020) will keep working. It now recommends Premier, and new course content goes there. If you're buying a Foresight unit now, budget for Foresight+.

Which plan I'd choose

For most home rooms with a GC3, Silver plus Course Pass gets you courses for $494 a year. If you want GSPro's 2,500+ community courses instead of Foresight's own, skip Course Pass and take Gold plus GSPro. If you mainly practise, Free or Silver is enough. For how this compares with other launch monitors, see what software costs each year.