7 Best Surf Forecast and Fishing Apps for Surf Fishing

With so many apps and websites available nowadays, it’s tough to figure out which one’s are worth while, and which ones are “full of it”. Every angler has, at least once, made a Google search for “the best fishing apps” in hopes of an app or website that might tell them exactly when and where to fish for their best odds of catching fish.

Over the years though, I’ve realized the apps that try to tell you when the fish will be biting are likely “full of it” rather, the best apps for fishing – and in this case surf fishing – are those that simply give you a clear picture of what the conditions will be. From there, it’s our job as anglers to determine what the best conditions for surf fishing are.

Best Conditions for Surf Fishing

I’ve gone into great detail about the topic of the best conditions for surf fishing in the linked article, but for the purposes of this article, I figured you guys might like to see how I use my favorite fishing app to analyze the best conditions for surf fishing. It might also surprise you that my top-rated “surf fishing app”, is actually an app designed for surfers. Check out the in depth tutorial on how to use Surfline for surf fishing.

Best Surf Fishing Apps

So now that I’ve already spoiled the surprise on my number one rated app for surf fishing, let’s talk about all the best apps for surf fishing.

Surfline: The Best Surf Fishing App

Surfline is my go to. You can download the app or visit their website at surfline.com. I would call this the most complete app for surf fishing on the market today. It’s very user friendly with great visuals to help the user quickly digest the conditions and it’s about as accurate as they come.

Surfline allows you to search your local beaches via a map view and/or favorite certain beaches. they have one of the largest databases of buoy data and cams, thus allowing them to generate various surf forecasts and live data for a plethora of beaches and breaks along the coast. For instance, just in San Diego County, Surfline has some 40+ unique locations to view and favorite.

Features:

• Unique conditions/forecasts per beach
• Live cams at many beaches (more cams with premium)
• Both live data and a future forecast of 15 days (premium)
• Surf height
• Swell height, period, and direction
• Wind speed and direction
• Tides
• Water temp
• Weather
• First light / last light /sunrise / sunset times
• And a daily run-down from a local surf forecast expert

Magic Seaweed: A Quality Surf Forecast App for Anglers and Surfers

Magicseaweed, the app that despite its name, has nothing to do with seaweed. Which is unfortunate because seaweed forecasts would be extremely valuable to us surf anglers. Magicseaweed also has an app and a website (magicseaweed.com). They’re very similar to Surfline, and I would actually argue their free version is as good, if not better than Surfline’s free version of the app.

Perhaps the best part about magicseaweed is their forecast view per beach. They have one of the best visual graphic in terms of a quick, general overview of current and future surf forecasts. They provide a very helpful chart that breaks down surf, swell, and wind that can be digested by most viewers in a matter of a second or two.

Features:

• Unique conditions/forecasts per beach
• No live cams
• Both live data and a future forecast
• Surf height
• Swell height, period, and direction
• Wind speed and direction
• Tides
• Water temp
• Minimal weather data
• First light / last light /sunrise / sunset times

Windy: For the Wind Fanatics

For those of you who simply don’t trust any other wind source, I present to you, Windy. Like all forecasting apps, it will have its inaccuracies every now and then, but Windy is easily the most reputable app when it comes to wind. What many don’t realize though, is that it shows a lot more data than wind. Before we get to what data it tracks, it’s worth mentioning the visuals are phenomenal and very easy to understand with live and future animated maps and weather patterns. Check out their website at windy.com.

Features:

• Amazing visuals
• Radar and satelite
• Rain, thunder
• Temperature
• Clouds
• Waves/swell
• Air quality and more

Nautide: A Solid Surf Fishing App

I don’t personally use Nautide, but it is a relatively popular app among surf anglers on the west coast. The visuals aren’t as good as Surfline and magicseaweed, but it does get the job done if you get used to it. They have a website at nautide.com, but it seems it’s only use is for you to download the app.

Features:

• Tides
• Solar/lunar
• Fish activity (almost never reliable)
• Atmospheric pressure
• Surf/swell
• Wind
• Weather

Surf-forecast.com: Dated But Works

Surf-forecast.com is another one that doesn’t work for me but might work for you. It’s a bit dated in appearance which makes for less than appealing visuals, but it’s database might actually be more vast than Surfline’s and it certainly gets the job done.

Features:

• Tides
• Surf/swell
• Weather
• Wind
• Water temp
• Sunrise/sunset

Tides4fishing: Very Cool Fishing Website

Tides4fishing.com is another very cool and helpful resource. It does attempt to predict major and minor feeding periods, and you all know how I feel about that, but all in all, it’s a quality resource.

Features:

• Weather
• Water temp
• Swell
• Tides
• Solunar
• And a bunch more

My Moon Phase App

My Moon Phase is just the app that I’ve happened to use for a while now. I don’t actually pay much attention to moon phases etc. except when it’s grunion season, but I am quite content with this app.

Features:

• Calendar access to moon phases
• Visuals of moon phases
• Sunrise/sunset
• Moonrise/moonset
• Moon distance
• Moon age
• Altitude
• Azimuth
• Moon zodiac
• Cycle chart
• Golden hour / blue hour

Your Favorite Weather App

These aren’t technically surf forecast or fishing apps, but everyone needs a good weather app to check their go-to fishing app against. I use a combination of my Apple weather app pre-installed on my iphone and an app called Weather Underground. Those work for me but you’ll find your own way. Sometimes the data built in to Surfline and/or magicseaweed or windy is enough, but I usually find myself verifying weather on the iphone app and verifying precipitation on Weather Underground.