Llantwit Major Surf Forecast and Surf Report

Alright folks, Rusty here. Let’s have a look at what the next couple of weeks are serving up for our stretch of coast.

Right off the bat, I’ve gotta be straight with you – it’s a bleak picture. We’re looking at a solid 16-day run with barely a ripple worth getting wet for. The first recommendation doesn't even kick in until the 1st of August, and even then, it’s a non-starter. The whole pattern is just a long, drawn-out spell of weak, short-period windswell and lousy wind directions. For most of the first week, we’ve got tiny waves and cross-onshore breezes that’ll leave the surface choppy and messy. There are long gaps where there’s simply nothing to recommend. This is one of those stretches where you’d be better off doing literally anything else.

Let’s run through it. Saturday the 1st of August at Llantwit Major starts off with a tiny 2ft swell straight out of the west, but with a cross-onshore wind. The combined energy is a paltry 21, and it’s just poor. Sunday the 2nd actually gets a little bit of glassy conditions in the afternoon, but the swell is down to 0.7ft – you could paddle, but you won’t be riding anything. That theme holds for the next few days: clean conditions here and there, like Monday morning the 3rd with a light easterly, but the wave height is barely 1ft. The combined energy is stuck in the low double-digits (24). It’s not surf.

By Wednesday the 5th, the wind picks up from the southwest and it’s just messy. The swell bumps up to 3ft by Wednesday afternoon, but it’s a 6-second period, cross-onshore, and the energy hits 81 – still weak and rubbish. Thursday the 6th sees the biggest numbers of the whole period with a 4ft swell and energy up to 107 (moderate), but it’s a cross-shore wind with a cross-chop. Not clean. Not good.

After that, it’s just a slow death. The waves drop back to ankle-snappers for days. There’s a brief moment of glass on the morning of Friday the 7th, but the swell is only 1ft. Then nothing until the morning of Tuesday the 12th, where we get a clean, light offshore breeze from the east-southeast and a 1.0ft swell with a bit more period (9 seconds) – still tiny, but at least the conditions look tidy. The combined energy is just 17. It’s the closest we get to a “nice morning” but it’s not surfable.

The second week is more of the same. A few pulses of waist-high junk with energy in the 40s and 70s, like the morning of Thursday the 13th (2ft, 44 energy) and the afternoon (2ft, 73 energy), but it’s always cross-onshore and choppy. By the 14th and 15th of August, the wind is howling from the west at 22 to 28 mph, making a proper mess of things. That kind of setup with a beach break and strong onshore wind is honestly better suited to kite surfing than a paddle board.

So there it is. No standout days. No hidden gems. Just a flat, windy, forgettable fortnight. The water temp is running at 69°, which is a solid 8° warmer than average for this time of year – that’s very unusual, so if you do go for a swim, it’ll feel like a bath, but don’t bother bringing your board. Forecasts can change, but this one looks locked in.

Rusty.

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