The trawler is the best known and the most internationally used of all fishing ship types. The decks must be particularly strong in way of the trawl gear. The heavy job of pulling a trawl net may reduce the speed of the boat from 8 knots to 1 knot. Manual work pulls the net in, or rather all of it but the cod end; then a rope is passed round the cod end and the gilson is used for a second time to bring the bag of fish in over the rail. The cod end knot is slipped and the fish fall out on the deck.

The size of a trawler is a little larger than a drifter.

The ship is a trawler shaped ship often built of wood, but more recently of steel; the steel hull is not necessarily the better. An average drifter is 86 ft. in length, by 18ft. 6 inches beam, by 8 ft. mean depth moulded. The draught aft is 11 ft. and 6 ft. backward. The service speed i.e speed to and from the fishing grounds, is about 9 knots. Most modern drifters have a cruiser stern, and are driven by internal combustion engines.