Surf Forecast Surf Report
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Santa Monica Pier Surf Stats

All swells

(any wind direction)

Good Surf

(light / offshore wind)

This image describes the variation of swells directed at Santa Monica Pier over a normal March, based on 3460 NWW3 model predictions since 2007 (values every 3 hours). The wave model does not forecast wind or surf right at the shore so we have chosen the most applicable grid node based on what we know about Santa Monica Pier, and at Santa Monica Pier the best grid node is 46 km away (29 miles). The rose diagram describes the distribution of swell sizes and directions, while the graph at the bottom shows the same thing but lacks direction information. Five colours show increasing wave sizes. The smallest swells, less than 0.5m (1.5 feet), high are coloured blue. These were forecast only 9% of the time. Green and yellow show increasing swell sizes and red represents highest swells greater than >3m (>10ft). In each graph, the area of any colour is proportional to how often that size swell happens. The diagram indicates that the prevailing swell direction, shown by the longest spokes, was SW, whereas the the dominant wind blows from the WNW. Because the wave model grid is offshore, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from Santa Monica Pier and away from the coast. We lump these in with the no surf category of the bar chart. To keep it simple we don't show these in the rose diagram. Because wind determines whether or not waves are surfable at Santa Monica Pier, you can load a different image that shows only the swells that were forecast to coincide with glassy or offshore wind conditions. During a typical March, swells large enough to cause good for surfing waves at Santa Monica Pier run for about 91% of the time.

Also see Santa Monica Pier wind stats

Compare Santa Monica Pier with another surf break

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