The Surf Report
WHAT THE BUOYS ARE ACTUALLY READING
Wave height, period, swell direction and water temperature straight off the NOAA buoys moored off San Diego — timestamped, and with the dead ones marked dead. No invented face heights.
Measured now
Mission Bay West · 62 min ago
Wave height
5.2ft
Solid
Period
20sec
Long-period groundswell
Direction
SSW
197° true
Water
74°F
Trunks or a springsuit
Open-water wave height measured by a buoy, not the height of the wave breaking on the sand.
What 20 seconds means
From a long way off, carrying real energy. Waves will break harder and further out than the height alone suggests, and sets will be widely spaced.
What people are wearing
Trunks or a springsuit. Warm enough that plenty of people skip neoprene entirely.
THE BUOYS
Three NOAA wave stations sit off this stretch of coast. Each reports every thirty minutes. When one stops, it keeps serving its last file — so age is shown for all of them, and anything over three hours old is struck out rather than used.
| Station | Height | Period | Dir | Water | Reading age |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Mission Bay West NDBC 46258 · the central San Diego beaches — Mission, Pacific and Ocean Beach | 5.2 ft | 20 s | SSW | 74° | 62 min ago |
Torrey Pines Outer NDBC 46225 · La Jolla and the North County beaches | 4.6 ft | 20 s | SSW | 73° | 62 min ago |
Point Loma South NDBC 46232 · the Point Loma and Sunset Cliffs stretch | 5.6 ft | 20 s | S | 74° | 32 min ago |
Source: NOAA National Data Buoy Center
TIDE TODAY
2:43am6.3 ft
8:55am0.3 ft
3:14pm5.5 ft
9:14pm12a4a8a12p4p8p0.0 ft MLLW
Low
2:43 AM
0.4 ft
High
8:55 AM
6.3 ft
Low
3:14 PM
0.3 ft
High
9:14 PM
5.5 ft
Source: NOAA Tides & Currents · San Diego Bay (NOAA station 9410170)
WHICH BREAKS THIS SWELL CAN REACH
A break can only receive swell from the arc of ocean it actually faces. The bar is that arc. The line is where this morning’s swell is arriving from — 197°, the SSW. Where the line crosses a bar, that break is receiving it: 3 of 12 this morning.
Swell is travelling toward the coast from 197° true.
These windows are our own reading of coastline aspect and offshore shadowing — a rule of thumb, not a measurement. They explain the big differences (why Sunset Cliffs needs a northwest swell and La Jolla Shores does not), not the last five degrees.
THE BREAKS, AND WHICH ONES THIS SWELL CAN REACH
Whether a swell reaches a break is mostly geometry — what angle it arrives from, and what is in the way. These windows are our own reading of coastline aspect and offshore shadowing, not a measured figure, so treat them as a rule of thumb rather than a guarantee. The exposure note for each break explains the reasoning.
North County
Cardiff Reef
In the windowA cobblestone reef with a long, sloping takeoff, which is why it suits everyone from longboarders to shortboarders on the same day. North County faces more squarely into the NW window than the city beaches do.
Access. Paid state beach lot at Cardiff State Beach, plus roadside parking on Coast Highway 101.
Crowd. Popular and mixed-ability, with a long-standing longboard contingent. Generally good-natured.
Swami's
Out of the windowA reef point that wraps swell into a long, predictable right, which is what separates it from the beach breaks — the wave holds its shape down the line rather than shutting down. Best on a NW groundswell with some period behind it.
Access. Free lot at Swami's Seaside Park above the break, then a long stairway down. It fills at dawn.
Crowd. One of the best-known breaks in California, and the lineup reflects that. Deep crowd of very competent surfers.
Oceanside Pier
Out of the windowThe harbour jetties to the north shape the sand and interrupt the natural southward sand drift, which is why the banks here behave differently from an unobstructed beach.
Access. Paid lots near the pier and metered street parking along the strand.
Crowd. Spread along a long beach, so it absorbs a crowd better than most. Both sides of the pier work.
La Jolla & Torrey Pines
Blacks Beach
In the windowScripps Submarine Canyon runs in almost to the beach here and focuses swell energy onto the sandbars, which is why Blacks routinely breaks noticeably bigger than La Jolla Shores two miles south on the same swell. The canyon is the reason this break has a reputation, not the sand.
Access. Steep unmaintained trails down the bluff from the Torrey Pines Gliderport, or a long walk north from Torrey Pines State Beach. Much of the beach is unguarded.
Crowd. Busy when it is good, and the people out are generally very good. Not a place to learn.
La Jolla Shores
In the windowPoint La Jolla sits directly northwest and blocks a large part of the NW swell window, which is exactly why this is the gentle one. The same headland that makes Windansea heavy makes the Shores mellow.
Access. Free street and lot parking at Kellogg Park — La Jolla has no parking meters anywhere. The problem is supply, not cost.
Crowd. The main beginner break in the city, so it is crowded with lessons and rental boards most of the year. Stay south of the lifeguard-marked swim zone.
Windansea
Out of the windowA cobblestone and reef bottom rather than sand, so the wave shape holds its form in bigger swell instead of closing out the way the beach breaks do. Exposed to the NW window that Point La Jolla shadows from the Shores.
Access. Street parking on Neptune Place, limited. The palm shack on the bluff is a designated historic landmark.
Crowd. Long-standing local scene and a reputation for it. Experienced surfers only, and not a place to paddle out to learn the etiquette.
The city beaches
Tourmaline Surf Park
Out of the windowA designated surf park set aside for board riding, so unlike the rest of Pacific Beach you are not weaving through swimmers. The point picks up less size than Windansea just north.
Access. Dedicated free lot at the foot of Tourmaline Street. Surfing only — swimming is not permitted here, which is why the water stays clear of swimmers.
Crowd. Longboard-heavy and generally friendly, but it is a small takeoff zone and it fills up.
Pacific Beach / Crystal Pier
Out of the windowOpen beach break facing west, so it catches almost anything but rarely holds shape in bigger swell — the sandbars close out. Good when it is small, unremarkable when it is big.
Access. Metered and time-limited street parking; it is genuinely hard in summer. Boardwalk access all along.
Crowd. Crowded with everyone — surfers, swimmers, rentals. The pier splits the peaks and people spread along the beach.
Mission Beach
Out of the windowShifting sandbars, so the quality moves up and down the beach through the year rather than sitting in one spot. The south jetty holds a more consistent bank than the open stretches.
Access. Belmont Park lots and street parking, both difficult in summer. Fire rings are nearby at the south end.
Crowd. Very busy in summer, and shared with a large swimming crowd. Check the flagged swim zones before paddling out.
Ocean Beach
Out of the windowSits just north of the Point Loma peninsula, so it keeps a fairly open west window while picking up swell the more sheltered spots south of the point miss entirely.
Access. Free lots at the pier and Dog Beach, filling early on weekends.
Crowd. Localised at the jetty, more relaxed along the main beach. Dog Beach is at the north end and is a different scene entirely.
Point Loma
Sunset Cliffs
Out of the windowThe Point Loma peninsula extends south below here and cuts off most of the southern swell window, so the cliffs favour NW groundswell far more than the beach breaks a few miles north. Reef bottom means it holds shape at size.
Access. Street parking along Sunset Cliffs Boulevard. Access is down unstable sandstone bluffs — the city posts cliff-failure warnings for a reason.
Crowd. A string of separate reefs rather than one break, each with its own regulars. Some are firmly local.
South Bay
Imperial Beach
Out of the windowWater quality is the deciding factor here, not swell. Cross-border flows from the Tijuana River reach this stretch and the county closes the shoreline frequently — sometimes for weeks. San Diego County Environmental Health publishes daily beach status and that page, not the surf forecast, is what decides whether this is surfable today.
Access. Free and metered parking near the pier. Check the county's beach status page before you go, every time.
Crowd. The least crowded surf in the county most days, for a reason that has nothing to do with the waves.
WHY WE DON’T PUBLISH A SURF HEIGHT
Almost every surf site shows you a number like “3–4 ft” or “chest high.” That number is a model output, not a measurement. Nobody is out there with a tape measure.
What actually gets measured is significant wave height — the average height of the biggest third of the waves rolling past a buoy moored in deep water, miles offshore. Turning that into the height of a wave breaking on one particular sandbar depends on the shape of the seafloor under that sandbar, and it changes between two peaks fifty yards apart.
So we publish what the buoy measured, we name the buoy, we timestamp it, and we leave the translation to you. Open-water wave height measured by a buoy, not the height of the wave breaking on the sand.
The upside: the numbers here are checkable. Every one of them comes from a NOAA station you can go and read yourself.
WHY A DEAD BUOY MATTERS
Buoys go offline and keep serving their last file. On the day we built this, station 46232 off Point Loma had been publishing a two-week-old ocean that parsed perfectly and looked completely normal. Everything on this page is judged on when the reading was taken, never on whether the download worked. Anything over three hours old is marked stale and kept out of the headline.
PERIOD IS THE NUMBER THAT MATTERS
If you only read one figure, read the seconds — not the feet. Period is how far apart the waves are, and it tells you whether the swell was made by wind that is still blowing on top of it, or by a storm far enough away that the waves have sorted themselves out on the journey.
Under 8 sec
Windswell
Local wind chop. Close together, disorganised, weak.
8–11 sec
Mid-period
A mix of local wind and something further out. Usually rideable, rarely memorable.
12–15 sec
Groundswell
Made by a distant storm and sorted out on the way in. Defined sets with gaps between them.
16 sec and up
Long-period groundswell
Real energy from a long way off. Breaks harder and further out than the height suggests.
Four feet at 16 seconds and four feet at 6 seconds are not the same day. The first is a real swell; the second is wind chop that happens to be the same height.
SWELL DIRECTION AND WHY HALF THE COAST IS FLAT
San Diego’s coastline is not a straight line facing one way, and there is a lot in the water offshore. The Point Loma peninsula blocks southern swell from the breaks tucked behind it. Point La Jolla shadows La Jolla Shores from the northwest, which is exactly why it is the gentle beginner break while Windansea a mile south is not. Two spots eight miles apart can genuinely be flat and firing on the same morning, and the direction figure is what tells you which is which.
San Diego conditions, right now