West Wittering Surf Forecast and Surf Report

Alright, Rusty here, and I’ll level with you—this 16-day stretch is a tough slog. If you're a surfer, you might want to take up lawn bowling for a bit. Let me walk you through it. The whole period is a bust. There's no standout session at all. The swell is tiny, the wind is almost always onshore or cross-onshore, and the water is weirdly warm.

The only spot in the picture is West Wittering. It’s a sheltered beach and groyne, so it needs a specific SW swell and clean wind to fire. For the whole 16 days, it's labeled as inconsistent, and that's exactly what we've got.

Water temp at West Wittering is 69°F, which is a whopping 7°F warmer than normal for this time of year. That's very unusual—feels like the English Channel forgot it's late summer.

Let’s run through it. Starting Friday, August 28th – morning is poor, with a tiny 2ft swell from the SW at a pathetic 3-second period, cross-on wind from the WSW at 19 mph. Combined energy is only 4, so there's nothing there. Afternoon gets a little size, 4ft, but the wind cranks up to 28 mph onshore. No good.

Saturday the 29th stays poor. A 4ft south swell in the morning with cross-on wind, then the afternoon sees 6ft from the SSW, but the wind is a near gale at 34 mph onshore. Combined energy hits 220, which is moderate, but the quality is garbage. That afternoon setup looks more interesting for kite surfing than paddle surfing.

Sunday the 30th is a write-off: 2ft with onshore wind.

Monday the 31st shows a 3ft SW swell, 8-second period, but cross-on wind again. Combined energy is 119, so there's some push, but the chop will be ugly.

From Tuesday, September 1st all the way through to Saturday, September 12th, every single session is rated as poor surf with a score of 0 out of 10. We’re talking tiny swell—mostly under 3ft—with onshore or cross-onshore winds. The longest gap with nothing worth mentioning is basically the entire second week. You get a flicker on Saturday, September 5th morning with a brief cross-shore wind from the WNW at 9 mph, but the swell is only 0.3ft. Then on Sunday, September 6th morning, the wind goes offshore from the NNE at 9 mph, giving clean conditions, but with a 0.3ft south swell and a combined energy of just 2, you'd need a lake to paddle the sea. It’s glassy but flat.

Later in the second week, around Thursday, September 10th and Friday, September 11th, there’s a tiny 0.3ft swell from the west, with light offshore or cross-off winds, and it’s clean. But honestly, it’s barely a ripple.

So the honest truth: there’s no best session here. The one that comes closest to being rideable is the Saturday afternoon (August 29th) if you were a strong kiter, but for a surfer, there’s nothing. The forecast confidence is high for the first week because it’s close, but it’s all bad. The second week is low confidence for any change, but given the pattern, I wouldn’t hold your breath.

This is a blank run, and for West Wittering, that’s pretty normal. It can stay poor for a while. But forecasts can change, so don’t toss your board just yet.

Rusty.

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