Nowadays the state-of-the-art in hydrodynamics has led to software based on numerical methods which are able to predict the hydrodynamics performance of complex geometry models. However, most of these software products require long computational times. This project aims at validating SeaFEM, a software based on the finite element method(FEM), against an empirical formulation for planing surfaces. This formulation was obtained by Daniel Savitsky, a former scientist of Davidson Laboratory. SeaFEM is a time-domain seakeeping software based on potential flow with a tuned free surface boundary condition that might be used for simulating planing hulls. The main advantage of SeaFEM compared to other hydrodynamics software is that the SeaFEM approach makes it much faster computationally speaking. In this project, a comparison will between Savitsky´s formulation and SeaFEM will be carried out. Then, the error propagation will be studied to obtain a correction formula. Finally, a discussion on the results will be provided.